In a new document titled “Laudate Deum,” or “Praise God,” the head of the Catholic Church issued his strongest warning yet that action is needed to alleviate suffering.

Pope Francis made his strongest statements yet about climate change Wednesday, rebuking fossil fuel companies and urging countries to make an immediate transition to renewable energy.

In a new document titled “Laudate Deum,” or “Praise God,” the pope criticizes oil and gas companies for greenwashing new fossil fuel projects and calls for more ambitious efforts in the West to tackle the climate crisis. In the landmark apostolic exhortation, a form of papal writing, Francis says that “avoiding an increase of a tenth of a degree in the global temperature would already suffice to alleviate some suffering for many people.”

“Laudate Deum” is a follow-up to the pope’s 2015 encyclical on climate change, known as “Laudato Si’,” which lamented the exploitation of the planet and cast the protection of the environment as a moral imperative. When it was released, “Laudato Si’” was viewed as an extraordinary move by the head of the Catholic Church to address global warming and its consequences.

Nearly a decade later, the pope’s message has taken on new urgency.

        • angrystego@lemmy.worldEnglish
          2·
          1 year ago

          Is Latin America not important enough? How about Poland or Italy? There are even 20% of catholics in the USA. According to Wiki, there is 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide - that’s important enough to me. Do you really think major religions play no role on the political stage?

        • wildgingerEnglish
          23·
          1 year ago

          Politicians fight dirty over smaller voting demographics, Im pretty sure its a big enough percent to make a difference

          E: the user I responded to attempted to impersonate me after losing this argument.

            • wildgingerEnglish
              23·
              1 year ago

              Oh, my bad, I was trying to be polite. Ill rephrase.

              You are wrong. The professional demographics manipulators know better than you do. Which is why you are asking a question you know cannot be answered in the way you posed it without a 5 year study on catholic peoples opinions on a broad range of topics before and after a public vatican statement involving those topics.

              The people whose jobs rely on the ability to read and understand demographics attribute weight to smaller demographics, and apply even greater weight to the catholic population. You are just openly incorrect.

              The cuban vote is considered a huge swing population. Thats at 2.4 million cuban descent americans. Catholic americans top off just under 62 million. I am pretty damn sure that 18% of americans is a very relevant percent of americans. And, more importantly, every single career politician is pretty damn sure too, and this is the one topic you can be confident that a politician actually knows what they are talking about.

                • wildgingerEnglish
                  22·
                  1 year ago

                  E: the user I am talking with here attempted to impersonate me, and got banned.

                  Politeness is a courtesy, not a virtue, and one you made clear you werent interested in returning.

                  You havent laid a case, you posed a question you know cant be answered. “Show me proof of the popes words changing catholic opinion in 3 decades” is nebulous nonsense and you know that. Its why you asked it. You would need a depth of polling data to “”“prove”“” that statement, which is often not public if anyone has even done that polling.

                  Now, you know fallacies as well as virtues, since I provided a single arguement. The professionals who know better than you know this demographic matters. I guess backing that up with the size of the demographic confused you? But the point stands firm, which is why youre blindly guessing Im religious (Im not, poor luck) instead of addressing it.

                  If youre really in a STEM field like you claim, you must not be great at your job. Most science professions require a better reading comprehension level than this.