Laudato Si’—Fifth Anniversary
Introduction
Elena Procario-Foley
The Cambridge University Press journal Horizons: The Journal of the College Theology Society has its roots in the progressive re-visioning of Roman Catholic theology after Vatican II, frequently understood as aggiornamento, and is committed to scholarship that is grounded in the Catholic incarnational/sacramental tradition. Horizons also fosters diverse scholarship across the fields of religious studies and theology, and is dedicated to a broad ecumenical perspective, a wide range of theological methods, and an intensive engagement of faith with culture.
On May 24, 2015, Pope Francis promulgated Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home. He wrote that the earth:
cries out to us because of the harm we have inflicted on her by our irresponsible use and abuse of the goods with which God has endowed her. We have come to see ourselves as her lords and masters, entitled to plunder her at will. The violence present in our hearts, wounded by sin, is also reflected in the symptoms of sickness evident in the soil, in the water, in the air and in all forms of life. This is why the earth herself, burdened and laid waste, is among the most abandoned and maltreated of our poor; she “groans in travail” (Rom 8:22). We have forgotten that we ourselves are dust of the earth (cf. Gen 2:7); our very bodies are made up of her elements, we breathe her air and we receive life and refreshment from her waters.[i]
The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed the connections between human overuse and abuse of the world’s natural resources and the all-too-human disregard for human life, especially the lives of the most vulnerable among us, the materially poor and our brothers and sisters of color. It is too early to predict if the pandemic will appreciably increase awareness of the integral connections among all forms of life and the health of the planet of which the pope so passionately writes. Even less certain is whether such awareness might translate into effective policies to address the climate crisis and redress the injustices suffered by the poor and marginalized.
Yet, though the scientific consensus utilized by Pope Francis in his encyclical may have been rejected by climate-change deniers and those who think popes should refrain from reflection on allegedly “non-religious topics” such as the environmental crisis, the evidence continues to build as a global pandemic rages. Scientists, for example, are studying the relationship between air quality and the rhythms of economic shutdown and reopening.gthy report “Preventing the Next Pandemic: Zoonotic diseases and how to break the chain of transmission.” The seventh message enumerates specific “disease drivers”:
Seven human-mediated factors are most likely driving the emergence of zoonotic diseases: 1) increasing human demand for animal protein; 2) unsustainable agricultural intensification; 3) increased use and exploitation of wildlife; 4) unsustainable utilization of natural resources accelerated by urbanization, land use change and extractive industries; 5) increased travel and transportation; 6) changes in food supply; and 7) climate change.[iii]
None of these factors is a surprise to scientists, geologians in the key of Father Thomas Berry, eco-theologians, and others who have long called for a dramatic conversion of our human relationship to the natural world. While the recent pandemic has produced the ubiquitous hashtag “we’re all in this together,” five years ago Pope Francis was already advocating that message. He wrote:
An interdependent world not only makes us more conscious of the negative effects of certain lifestyles and models of production and consumption which affect us all; more importantly, it motivates us to ensure that solutions are proposed from a global perspective, and not simply to defend the interests of a few countries. Interdependence obliges us to think of one world with a common plan.[iv]
The editors of Horizons offer this virtual issue mindful of the unfathomable suffering the climate crisis perpetrates on people around the globe. We recognize that this suffering disproportionately affects our sisters and brothers abused by the intertwined systemic injustices of racism, poverty, and inadequate (or non-existent) healthcare. Using the keywords cosmos, cosmology, ecology, ecological, and environment, a search of previous issues yielded twenty articles between 1985 and 2017. Seven articles have been selected for this virtual issue. For those who wish to read more, the editors recommend the Spring 1994 issue of Horizons (21:1), which marked the twentieth anniversary of the journal with a thematic issue on “nature and earth, science and cosmology.” The articles include insights from Islam, Buddhism, Catholicism, and Orthodox Christianity.
Pope Francis gives substance to the pandemic’s rallying cry that we are all in this together. His words are even more evident today than five years ago:
The human environment and the natural environment deteriorate together; we cannot adequately combat environmental degradation unless we attend to causes related to human and social degradation. In fact, the deterioration of the environment and of society affects the most vulnerable people on the planet.[v]Thanks are due to Horizons’ managing editor Christine Bucher for suggesting the theme for Virtual Issue V and researching back issues for potential articles.
[i] Pope Francis, On Care for Our Common Home (Laudato Si’), May 24, 2015, §2, https://w2.vatican.va/content/dam/francesco/pdf/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si_en.pdf.
[ii] For just one example, see Coral Davenport, “Pandemic’s Cleaner Air Could Reshape What We Know about the Atmosphere,” New York Times, June 25, 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/25/climate/coronavirus-clean-air.html.
[iii] United Nations Environment Programme and International Livestock Research Institute, Delia Grace Randolph et al., “Preventing the Next Pandemic: Zoonotic diseases and how to break the chain of transmission,” (Nairobi, Kenya, 2020), 7. https://wedocs.unep.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.11822/32316/ZP.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y. See also the press release announcing the report, https://www.unenvironment.org/news-and-stories/press-release/unite-human-animal-and-environmental-health-prevent-next-pandemic-un.
[iv] Pope Francis, On Care for Our Common Home, §164; italics original.
[v] Ibid., §48.