Human progress depends on care for the environment, Pope says

Aug 26, 2009 / 09:09 am

Wednesday's general audience was held at the papal summer residence in Castel Gandolfo, where Pope Benedict XVI spoke about the precious gift of Creation, emphasizing that humanity's treatment of the environment impacts “integral human development.”

“The different phenomena of environmental degradation and natural catastrophes,” Pope Benedict explained, “which unfortunately occur all too often, remind us of the urgency of dutiful respect toward nature, recovering and valuing a correct relationship with the environment each day.”

Returning to a message from his recent encyclical and his upcoming message for the World Day of Peace, Pope Benedict said that protecting the environment and being good stewards of it are “intimately linked with integral human development.”

“In my recent encyclical, Caritas in Veritate, I referred to such questions recalling the ‘pressing moral need for renewed solidarity’ not only between countries but also between individuals, since the natural environment is given by God to everyone,” Benedict XVI added. “Our use of it entails a personal responsibility towards humanity as a whole, particularly towards the poor and towards future generations.”

The Holy Father also tied the protection of mankind to the protection of the environment, adding,“the Church is not only committed to promoting the defense of land, water and sky, given by the Creator to all, but above all, she does so to protect man against self-destruction.”

“Creation, structured in an intelligent manner by God, is entrusted therefore to man, who is in a position to interpret it and actively remodel it without considering himself the absolute patron of it,” the Pope expounded. “Man is called, above all, to exercise responsible governance of it, cultivating it and finding necessary resources for a dignified existence of all.”

Turning to treatment of Creation around the globe, Benedict XVI said, “How important it is then, that the international community and individual governments send the right signals to their citizens and succeed in countering harmful ways of treating the environment! The economic and social costs of using up shared resources must be recognized with transparency and borne by those who incur them, and not by other peoples or future generations.”

“The protection of the environment, and the safeguarding of resources and of the climate, oblige all leaders to act jointly, respecting the law and promoting solidarity with the weakest regions of the world,” Pope Benedict added. “Together we can build an integral human development beneficial for all peoples, present and future, a development inspired by the values of charity in truth.”

The Pope also acknowledged that to accomplish this feat “it is essential that the current model of global development be transformed through a greater, and shared, acceptance of responsibility for creation. This is demanded not only by environmental factors, but also by the scandal of hunger and human misery.”

“Dear brothers and sisters,” the Pope concluded, “may we thank the Lord and make ours the words of St. Francis in the Canticle of the Sun: ‘Most high, all powerful, all good Lord! All praise is yours, all glory, all honor, and all blessing…Be praised, my Lord, through all your creatures.’ Such was St. Francis. May we also want to pray and live in the spirit of these words.”