SLATE COLUMN: …This Vatican moment was a game-changer. Science and religion were forcefully and unwaveringly aligning.
Tuesday’s high-level session brought together multiple presidents, CEOs, academics, scientists, and all the major religions, and ended withthis final, forceful statement. The event was a prelude to the Pope’s summer encyclical on climate change, and it laid a solid foundation.
The Vatican’s [Vatican’s Cardinal Peter Turkson], meanwhile, pulled out all the stops, saying that “a crime against the natural world is a sin,” and “to cause species to become extinct and to destroy the biological diversity of God’s creation … are sins.” Turkson warned about how quickly we are degrading the planet’s integrity, stripping its forests, destroying its wetlands, and contaminating its waters, land, and air.
These declarations were not soft, feel-good, and vague speeches by politicos keen to be perceived as leading on the most urgent issue facing humanity. These were unequivocal, unwavering statements: “Decision mitigation is a moral and religious imperative for humanity” and the “summit in Paris may be the last effective opportunity” to keep the planet safe… (more)
