During a speech addressing a group of international
scientists, including theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, the pope warned
against turning away from climate pacts for political reasons — a thinly veiled
reference to U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who has promised to withdraw
the United States from the historic U.N. Paris climate agreement.
“The ‘distraction’ or delay in implementing global agreements on the environment shows that politics has become submissive to a technology and economy which seek profit above all else,” Francis said, according to a Reuters report.
Since assuming the role of pope, Francis has been a
staunch proponent of environmental action. In the summer of 2015, he released an encyclical — one of the highest forms of
official teaching that a pope can produce — on the environment.
The result was
a sweeping document, nearly 200 pages long, which flatly rejected conservative
Christian justifications for exploiting the planet and defended environmental
action on religious and moral grounds.
According to Reuters, Francis’ speech on Monday struck
largely the same tone. He told the audience that humans could not think of
themselves as “owners and masters of nature, authorized to plunder it without
any consideration of its hidden potential and laws of development” and called
for “an ecological conversion capable of supporting and promoting sustainable
development.”
Francis has been a supporter of the Paris climate agreement since it was
finalized in December of 2015, and urged world leaders to join the agreement
almost as soon as it was signed last year.
The BBC
even reported that Francis might have had a hand in pushing the deal
through himself, allegedly calling the president of Nicaragua to convince him
to sign the deal.
The pope was also a vocal critic of Trump’s rhetoric during the
presidential campaign. In February, Francis criticized the tenor of Trump’s campaign,
suggesting that Trump’s visions did not mesh well with the Christian faith.
“A person who thinks only about building walls, wherever
they may be, and not building bridges, is not Christian,” Francis said.
Trump fired back, saying that “for a religious leader to
question a person’s faith is disgraceful.”
Trump has pledged to withdraw the United States from the
Paris agreement, which he has called “bad for business.” He has also falsely
claimed that the deal allows “foreign bureaucrats control over how much energy
we use.”
In reality, the Paris deal is built upon a series of nationally determined contributions, which allows each
country to plot their own course for emissions reductions.
Proponents of the
deal also argue that it will likely unlock massive amounts of investment in clean energy,
helping to revitalize economies and spur job growth in countries that remain
within the agreement.
As Joe Romm pointed out in an earlier piece on
ThinkProgress, the Paris climate deal is a “ridiculously good deal” for the United States — it gives
the country the chance to avoid massive amounts of costly damage while pledging
the minimum effort.
The president-elect, who once penned a book titled The
Art of the Deal, does not seem to recognize what a truly great deal the
Paris agreement is, both for the United States and the world.
And if his
previous responses to papal advice are any indication, he’ll likely fail to
recognize the pope’s plea for climate action, as well.
Author
Natasha Geiling is a reporter
at ThinkProgress. Contact her: ngeiling@americanprogress.org
