Global Climate Change and Two Cardinals

Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga

On December 4th of this year Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga delivered a homily at a special Mass in Durban South Africa during The United Nations Climate Change Conference. With all due respect to the Cardinal I believe there are some problems for the Church in endorsing the belief in man made climate change, and in offering moral support to the UN in seeking binding commitments that would determine what nations may or may not do in manufacturing or farming.

"Caritas Internationalis President Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga says failure at UN climate talks in Durban is a “moral apartheid” that cannot be allowed to happen."
During a special Mass at Emmanuel Cathedral in Durban, Cardinal Rodriguez noted “Just as South Africa’s Apartheid era policies sought divisions along race lines, today the world’s environment and energy policies divide man from nature”.

“Prepare a way for the Lord, make his paths straight ” (Mark 1:1-8) The liturgy of this Second Sunday of Advent seems to have been designed for this COP17 we are attending. The first Reading already called on us to “Console my people, console them”. Barely a week ago, torrential downpours caused a great deal of suffering and death in Durban. Don’t we realize that the climate is out of control? How long will countless people have to go on dying before adequate decisions are taken?"


“Living holy and saintly lives” means living in justice with creation and the environment, and especially with the poor people who are the primary victims of this serious problem. In the desert John “cried out” the need to prepare a way for the Lord. Today, in the desert of our planet Earth, and in the desert of our hearts, the same voice is ringing out. This conference of delegates from so many countries cannot remain as a voice silenced by economic power."

Is Cardinal Maradiaga more right than he knows when he states that; “Just as South Africa’s Apartheid era policies sought divisions along race lines, today the world’s environment and energy policies divide man from nature” in that the belief in man made climate change is really a means to effect political and social change regardless of whether it is true or not that man is changing the climate. As apartheid was a political act so too are the actions of believers in man made climate change to coerce nations to commit their citizens to legally binding commitments that affect their sovereignty, and economic well being.

"On Saturday the U.N.'s climate chief Christiana Figueres said she believes countries can snap the deadlock that has lasted for years and sign up to fresh and binding commitments to cut greenhouse gases, after a week of climate talks between nearly 200 countries. The main issue still on the table after one week of talks is the extension of the Kyoto protocol which sets legal limits on green house gas emissions. The world’s two major economies – and two biggest emitters - China and the United States, who are not signatories of the protocol have yet to commit to agreeing to a binding deal. Canada, Russia and Japan meanwhile have said they will not renew the 1997 Kyoto Protocol pledges that expire next year, while the European Union wants to broker a new, global pact." - from News.VA The Vatican Today December 7th, 2011

The US and China are singled out as the worlds two major economies and biggest emitters who did not sign the Kyoto protocol. The US is the third largest agricultural producer in the world, and is the number one exporter of agricultural products. China and India are number one and number two respectively in agricultural production but by necessity they are the largest consumers of their own agricultural products.  The US is still the largest manufacturing nation in the world, although China is poised to overtake the US in manufacturing. The US is not the largest exporter of manufactured goods, but as the largest manufacturer of goods, the number three nation in agricultural production, and the leading exporter of food products it stands to reason that the US is one of the "biggest emitters of greenhouse gases".

The UN and the IPCC have the goal of creating a global centralized economy that will decide based upon the impact on the climate what will be produced and how it will be produced. Cardinal Maradiaga is understandably concerned with human suffering and he has a good heart. The good Cardinal should read The Harvest of Sorrow by Robert Conquest. Mr. Conquest details the history of the famine in the Ukraine that was caused by the agricultural and industrial central planning of the Soviet government. An estimated 2 million to 8 million Ukrainians perished of starvation in one of the richest agricultural areas in the world. This humanitarian disaster took place between 1932 and 1933. Some call this genocide rather than an economic action. It is interesting that these "genocides" occur in totalitarian states that practice the centralized control of their economies. The Soviets created this disaster by trying to increase production. The IPCC is proposing to achieve control of the climate by decreasing production. When the cost of growing and exporting food is tied to economic commitments or sanctions concerning "greenhouse gas emissions" and it is no longer economically viable for US growers and shippers to export food the citizens of the worlds poorest nations will be the first to starve.

Cardinal George Pell

The following quotes are from the 2011 Global Warming Policy Foundation Annual Lecture at Westminster Cathedral Hall in London on October 26 given by Cardinal George Pell. Cardinal Pell has a different view of man made climate change.


"At a recent meeting of the priests' council in Sydney one parish priest asked me why I was commenting publicly on the role of carbon dioxide in the climate, because in the past the Church had made a fool of herself on a number of occasions."

"I replied that I was well aware of at least some of these instances and that one reason why I was speaking out was to avoid having too many Christian leaders repeating these mistakes and to provide some balance to ecclesiastical offerings."

"Science and technology have already achieved considerable mastery over nature, and massive local achievements. But where is the borderline separating us from what is beyond human power? Where does scientific striving become uneconomic, immoral or ineffectual and so lapse into hubris? Have scientists been co-opted onto a bigger, better advertised and more expensive bandwagon than the millennium bug fiasco?"

"Since the climate had been changing - as Professor Plimer puts it, ever since that first Thursday 4,567 million years ago when the Earth began and the atmosphere began to form - I am not a "denier" of climate change and I am not sure whether any such person still exists.


"Therefore the term "climate change denier", however expedient as an insult or propaganda weapon, with its deliberate overtones of comparison with Holocaust denial, is not a useful description of any significant participant in the discussion."

"In the 1990s we were warned of the "greenhouse effect", but in the first decade of the new millennium "global warming" stopped. The next retreat was to the concept of "anthropogenic global warming" or AGW; then we were called to cope with the challenge of "climate change". Then it became apparent that the climate is changing no more now than it has in the past. Seamlessly, the claim shifted to "anthropogenic climate disruption".

"These redefinitions have captured the discourse. Who would want to be denounced and caricatured as a "denier"?"


"Another more spectacular example of this successful spin is the debate on "carbon footprints", on the advisability or not of a "carbon tax". We all know that it is the role of carbon dioxide in climate change which is in question, not the role of carbon, but we continue to talk about carbon. The public discussion is almost entirely conducted in terms of "carbon footprints" and a "carbon tax", provoking colorful but misconceived images of carcinogenic burnt toast and narrow, Dickensian chimneys being cleaned by unhealthy young chimney sweeps. It is brilliant advertising. But it is untrue."

"Despite the fact that Wikipedia's entry on air pollution now includes carbon dioxide emissions in a list of "greenhouse gas pollutants", CO2 does not destroy the purity of the atmosphere, or make it foul or filthy (the Oxford Dictionary definition of a pollutant). It is not a pollutant, but part of the stuff of life."

"Animals would not notice a doubling of CO2 and obviously plants would love it. In the other direction, humans would feel no adverse effects unless CO2 concentration rose to at least 5000ppmv, or almost 13 times today's concentration, far beyond any likely future atmospheric levels."

I have provided links to both Cardinal Maradiaga's homily and Cardinal Pell's lecture.

Sins of Omission and Commission


The following quotes are from a Forbes online article that was published on November 23, 2011. These e-mails should be examined very closely by those Church officials that support the belief in man made global warming. 

"A new batch of 5,000 emails among scientists central to the assertion that humans are causing a global warming crisis were anonymously released to the public yesterday, igniting a new firestorm of controversy nearly two years to the day after similar emails ignited the Climategate scandal."

Quotes from the e-mails

“I’ve been told that IPCC is above national FOI [Freedom of Information] Acts. One way to cover yourself and all those working in AR5 would be to delete all emails at the end of the process,” writes Phil Jones, a scientist working with the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), in a newly released email.

"Any work we have done in the past is done on the back of the research grants we get – and has to be well hidden,” Jones writes in another newly released email. “I’ve discussed this with the main funder (U.S. Dept of Energy) in the past and they are happy about not releasing the original station data.”

"The new emails also reveal the scientists’ attempts to politicize the debate and advance predetermined outcomes."- from Forbes

“The trick may be to decide on the main message and use that to guid[e] what’s included and what is left out” of IPCC reports, writes Jonathan Overpeck, coordinating lead author for the IPCCs most recent climate assessment.

These new emails add weight to Climategate 1.0 emails revealing efforts to politicize the scientific debate. For example, Tom Wigley, a scientist at the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, authored a Climategate 1.0 email asserting  that his fellow Climategate scientists “must get rid of” the editor for a peer-reviewed science journal because he published some papers contradicting assertions of a global warming crisis. - from Forbes

"More than revealing misconduct and improper motives, the newly released emails additionally reveal frank admissions of the scientific shortcomings of global warming assertions." - from Forbes

“Observations do not show rising temperatures throughout the tropical troposphere unless you accept one single study and approach and discount a wealth of others. This is just downright dangerous. We need to communicate the uncertainty and be honest. Phil, hopefully we can find time to discuss these further if necessary,” writes Peter Thorne of the UK Met Office.

“I also think the science is being manipulated to put a political spin on it which for all our sakes might not be too clever in the long run,” Thorne adds.

“Mike, The Figure you sent is very deceptive … there have been a number of dishonest presentations of model results by individual authors and by IPCC,” Wigley acknowledges.

This small sampling of e-mails speak for themselves. Skepticism of man made global warming or at least a public attitude of  "we are not sure that the research has proven conclusively that man is the cause of climate change" I believe is the best course for the Church. 

Words Have Meaning

The only time I can ever remember being tempted to break the law was on a trip to Eugene Oregon. My wife was shopping in an area near the University of Oregon campus so I decided to take a walk while she explored different shops. During the walk I came across a wall that had been "tagged". Tagged is a euphemism for vandalising property by spray painting or marking it with an indelible marker. The marking can be a symbol or words.

The tag stated; We cannot be certain of anything. My first thought was I need to find a hobby shop or hardware store. I needed paint. My reply, had I a marker would have been; If we cannot be certain of anything, then we can be certain of being uncertain. Certainty does exist.

The choice of "we" rather than "I" in the statement is significant because the writer is really stating that if he cannot be certain neither can you. The first implication is that there is a communal or collective intellect. The second implication is that there is no objective truth or reality because existence of that truth or reality is dependent upon all of us agreeing that it exists.

I have spent the last few days following the comments of various writers as they describe their own reactions, or report on the reactions of Catholics to the new Roman Missal. As one would expect there are positive and negative comments from both clergy and the laity.

One of the most important changes in the New Missal is the Profession of Faith. "We believe" is now "I believe". When you say I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, you are affirming with your intellect and your heart your belief. Salvation is not a communal or a collective action. One may have private doubts from time to time, but it is your profession of faith, and it is made to God out of your love, you cannot make a profession of faith for another.

I have included some background information and links that the reader might find interesting. I am not going to comment on the article from America Magazine except to say that the writer seems to have more of a problem with the authority of the Holy See than he does with the New Missal. You can draw your own conclusions.

Just Thomism is one of those treasures you find when you least expect it. There is a link below to the Just Thomism blog.

The following quotes are from a NY Times article on November 28th, 2011.

"Catholics throughout the world worshiped in Latin until Vatican II, when the church granted permission for priests to celebrate Mass in other languages. The English translation used until this weekend was published in the early 1970s and modified in 1985. Scholars then began work on a new translation, and by 1998 a full draft of the new missal was completed and approved by bishops’ conferences around the English-speaking world".

"But Rome never approved that translation, and instead, in 2001, issued new guidelines requiring that the language of the Mass carefully follow every word of the Latin text, as well as the Latin syntax, where possible. That marked a dramatic philosophical shift from the more flexible principle of “dynamic equivalence” that had guided the earlier translations."

These two paragraphs from the NY Times are a fairly accurate summary of the time line concerning the old and new Roman Missal.

Dynamic Equivalence and Formal Equivalence

The following quotes come from the blog Just Thomism. The entire article is well worth reading and is an excellent explanation of dynamic equivalence and formal equivalence concerning  translation.

"The usual way of explaining the transition to the Third Edition is by a shift in the method of translation from dynamic equivalence (DE) to formal equivalence (FE). For those who are critical of the previous editions, this has been the basis of much ironic berating of DE. I’m in an odd position, for I think both that DE is necessary and that there are very severe criticisms that one can make of the old editions. One has two options: if “dynamic equivalence” is taken as a method of translation, then the criticisms of the old edition are not entirely and for the most part a critique of DE; and if one insists that the old editions are faithful workings out of the principles of DE, then DE is not a entirely a kind of translation. I favor the first interpretation, since we miss crucial things about translation unless we see it as a tension between FE and DE; and the criticism of the old editions is not a criticism of a method of translation but of theological and philosophical premises that were used to change and suppress ideas in the original text."

"It is wrong to call the older editions dynamically equivalent. This distorts the nature of DE and sets it in facile opposition to FE, whereas they are really two tools necessary for proper translation. A criticism of the old editions is not based on looking at the principles of translation, but on the philosophical positions that served as tools of suppression of ideas of changes in meaning. For example, the old editions as a rule suppressed any reference to a soul or a human spirit. To the extent that one was taught only by the old editions of the liturgical texts, he would have no idea that he had a spiritual existence or part of himself. This is, to my mind, an insuperable criticism of the old texts, but (to hit the horse one last time) it is not a criticism of translation, still less of dynamic equivalence – at least if DE is taken as a method of translation, and there is very good reason to do so."

The following post comes from Catholic World Report.

Personhood in the Age of the Theorist-Consumer

The basic problem with wanting to have it both ways.

December 02, 2011 05:22 EST

By Carl E. Olson

The basic problem with wanting to have it both ways is that you usually end up with either nothing or (more often) the destruction of the good. We Americans, sadly, have a weakness for having it both ways—or at least wanting to have it both ways. This is highlighted, in philosophical terms, quite well by Gary Gutting, a professor of philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, in a short essay, "On Abortion and Defining a ‘Person’". Writing about the recent, failed personhood referendum in Mississippi, Gutting observes the rejection of the referendum" showed that many Americans — including many strong opponents of abortion — are reluctant to treat a fertilized egg as a human person. They are, in particular, unwilling to extend the full protection of our laws against murder to a fertilized egg. This might seem to be just a common sense reaction to an extreme position, but rejecting the personhood position has important consequences for the logic of the abortion debate."

"The basic problem", Gutting rightly points out,

... is that, once we give up the claim that a fertilized egg is a human person (has full moral standing), there is no plausible basis for claiming that all further stages of development are human persons. The DNA criterion seems to be the only criterion of being human that applies at every stage from conception to birth. If we agree that it does not apply at the earliest stages of gestation, there is no basis for claiming that every abortion is the killing of an innocent human person.

Those convinced that abortion is murder can, of course, maintain that this entire line of argument merely shows that we must hold that the fertilized egg is a human person: abortion is always wrong and it wouldn’t be if the fertilized egg weren’t a person. But what the Mississippi referendum showed was that many of those strongly opposed to abortion do not believe this. They were not willing, for example, to forbid aborting pregnancies that result from rape or incest or that are necessary to save the mother’s life. Many were also unwilling to charge fertility doctors who destroy frozen embryos with murder or to forbid after-fertilization birth control devices such as I.U.D.’s.

And so, if people are logical and committed to the integrity of the evidence and first principles (whether scientific or philosophical in nature), they cannot have it both ways. But, alas, they want to have it both ways—and, legally at least, do. "I am not claiming that those who reject the personhood of a fertilized egg have no grounds for opposing abortion", Gutting writes, "But they cannot consistently claim that all abortions, even at very early stages or in special circumstances, are wrong."
Phil Lawler, writing on CatholicCulture.org about the referendum immediately after it was voted down, put it in blunt, caustic terms:

Yesterday the people of Mississippi voted not to amend their state constitution to declare that human life begins at conception. Nevertheless the scientific fact remains: Human life begins at conception.

Unless I am mistaken the Mississippi constitution is silent on the law of gravity. Perhaps at some future date the state will schedule a referendum on another proposed amendment, enabling the voters to declare themselves for or against gravity. The results, however, will be moot. No matter how the votes are cast, the law of gravity will remain in effect.

His analysis is excellent, as always, and includes this significant observation:

First, note that the Personhood Initiative did not ask the people to settle a scientific dispute. This was not the equivalent of asking the king to flatten a round earth. The scientific question is settled; the facts are beyond dispute. The referendum asked Mississippi voters to acknowledge a scientific reality and its necessary consequences. Abortion advocates threw all of their considerable resources into a campaign to persuade people that they should not examine the evidence, because the evidence damns their argument. The most unsettling thing about yesterday’s vote is the realization that a majority of voters were swayed by that crude propaganda campaign.

This brings to mind a section from Peter Augustine Lawler’s excellent new book, Modern and American Dignity: Who We Are as Persons, and What That Means for Our Future (ISI, 2010), in a chapter titled, "American Nominalism and Our Need for the Science of Theology". Lawler (no relation, I think, to the above mentioned Phil Lawler) puts his finger on a strange dichotomy, or existential chasm even, found among many Americans: "It's especially clear that we Americans see ourselves both more personally and more impersonally than ever. Virtually all sophisticated Americans claim to believe that Darwin teaches the whole truth about who or what we are. For Darwin, the individual human being exists only to serve the human species."

After unpacking that remark a bit, Lawler than notes the whip-lash, illogical approach taken by these folks: "The same sophisticated Americans who pride themselves on being whole-hog Darwinians speak incessantly about the freedom and dignity of the individual and are proud of their freedom to choose. The particularly modern source of pride remains personal freedom from all authority, including the authority of God and nature. Our professed confidence in the reality of that freedom may be stronger than ever today. ... We Americans, in fact, are so unscientific that we don't even try to account for what we can see with our own eyes."

Exactly right. This is very much in keeping with Walker Percy's description of Americans as being essentially "theorist-consumers": we like to employ various theories (usually draped in scientistic language) about nearly everything, but when the rubber meets the road, it's really about our desires, our dreams, our right to choose and our freedom to consume. In the words of Percy:

Americans are the nicest, most generous, and sentimental people on earth. Yet Americans have killed more unborn children than any nation in history. ... It is not "horrible" that over a million unborn children were killed in America last year [Percy was writing around 1989]. For one thing, one does not see many people horrified. It is not horrible, because in an age of theory and consumption it is appropriate that actions be carried out as the applications of theory and the needs of consumption require. ("Why Are You a Catholic?", from Signposts in a Strange Land [1991])

In other words, we like to have it both ways. And if that means ignoring the truth about conception and the unborn and the dignity of human life, hey, we can mumble something about democracy and votes and the law. It sounds good in theory, but it is a lie that consumes the soul. And therein so often lies the wide road to the destruction of the good and the denial of God.