Justice/Environment

JustMatters Shares Information

JustMatters is a new mini-series of formation materials from JustFaith Ministries. It focuses on one social justice topic for six to eight sessions. The current topic is Global Climate Change.  Here is a small sampling of what Just Matters participants are learning:
 
The Vatican Goes Green!
This past summer more than 1000 solar panels were installed atop the Paul VI Audience Hall and later the Vatican became the 1st state in Europe to go completely carbon neutral.
 
Pope Benedict XVI has said, “Everyone can see today that humanity could destroy the foundation of its own existence, its earth, and therefore we can’t simply do whatever we want with this earth that has been entrusted to us, what seems to us in a given moment useful or promising, but we have to respect the inner laws of creation, of this earth, we have to learn these laws and obey them if we want to survive.  This obedience to the voice of the earth is more important for our future happiness than the voices of the moment, the  desires of the moment. … Existence itself, our earth, speaks to us, and we have to listen.”
 
From the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which along with Al Gore won this year’s Nobel Peace Prize:
—A consensus of 2500 scientific reviewers:  the global temperature is rising.
—There is a 30% chance of species extinction.
—Shifts in crop ranges will occur.
—Drought and flooding will increase.
—Glacial melt and rising water levels on island and coastal communities are occurring.
—The effects of human induced climate change are now apparent on every continent.

“All will not be affected equally:  Those with the least resources have the least capacity to adapt and are the most vulnerable.”
 
To learn more about your family’s “carbon footprint” and ways to reduce your impact on the environment take the Minnesota Energy Challenge at mnenergychallenge.org.  Even a family of 3 can put upwards of 50,000 pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year and that CO2  will remain in the atmosphere up to 100 years.