Bishop Marcelo Sánchez Sorondo, chancellor of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, told the London-based Catholic Agency for Overseas Development, "Climate change has become a major social and moral problem, and mentalities can only be changed on moral and religious ground."
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He also placed Pope Francis squarely amid the world's forces dealing with the issue when he said the Pontifical Academy of Sciences supported the idea of an environmental encyclical that might help influence decisions at two major global gatherings next year.
Vatican watchers say they expect an encyclical on the environment to be released sometime in the first part of 2015.
Any pronouncement by Francis, of course, will be but the latest in a string of strongly worded papal statements, some extremely countercultural and jarring of the status quo about the environment. No less a figure than Pope John Paul II gave the environment a central place amid church concerns in his 1990 World Day of Peace message.
At several points, John Paul emphasized that the ecological crisis is, on many levels, a moral crisis. The moral implications are most deeply apparent in "the lack of respect for life evident in many of the patterns of environmental pollution. Often, the interests of production prevail over concern for the dignity of workers, while economic interests take priority over the good of individuals and even entire peoples."
His prognosis for the health of the planet absent radical changes in attitudes and lifestyle is pessimistic; the critique of prevailing cultures, especially those of rich and highly industrialized nations, is unsparing.
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