Green Options » Catholic

Sell the Vatican, Feed the World

Rhonda Winter — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 17:31:13 +0000

Comedian Sarah Silverman explains her ambitiously brilliant plan to end world hunger. She calls on Ratzinger, the chief architect responsible for obfuscating many of the Catholic Church’s most horrific sexual abuse scandals, to sell the Vatican and feed the world with the money.

“We need a hero, and who is more primed to be our hero than the pope? He’s literally a caped crusader,” explains Silverman. I think that she might be on to something.

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The Pope is Going Green

Allison Boyer — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 17:42:32 +0000

Pope Benedict XVI has once again called on Catholics everywhere to go green. This past week, he used his Epiphany Day homily to call for action against global warming and polluting.

This isn’t the first time the Pope has pushed to save the environment. In September of 2007, the Vatican installed solar panels; in December, he talked about our need to conserve energy; and last July, he equated the collection of material goods to the worship of false idols and asked people to realize that the Earth needs help.

“Perhaps reluctantly, we come to acknowledge that there are scars which mark the surface of our earth — erosion, deforestation, the squandering of the world’s mineral and ocean resources in order to fuel an insatiable consumption.”

The Vatican has also supported renewable energy in the past.

Picture via Wikicommons from Fabio Pozzebom

Jesus is Coming. Look Busy.

Jeff McIntire-Strasburg — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 14:39:03 +0000

Editor’s note: Chad Crawford, our regular writer on the intersection of religion and the environment, is taking some vacation time this week, so we’re pleased to offer another post from one of Professor Siman Sethi’s students in her Media and the Environment course at the University of Kansas. Writer Lauren Keith originally published this post to the course blog on Tuesday, March 11, 2008.

Are you there, God? It’s me, global warming.

When I logged on to Facebook yesterday, I was disturbed to see that my two least favorite things (organized religion and Yahoo! Inc.) have friend requested my best buddy, the Green Movement.

And the Green Movement accepted their friend request.

In a story posted yesterday on Yahoo! Green (which I had no idea existed until 12 hours ago), the Catholics’ second-in-command declared pollution a sin.

Vatican Goes Solar

Maria Surma Manka — Tue, 29 May 2007 12:45:31 +0000

People of faith from around the globe are taking the lead on global warming solutions. Following on the heels of an alliance among some U.S. faith leaders to fight global warming, the Vatican has announced plans to install a giant solar power system.

The 1,000 solar panels will adorn the football-sized roof of the Paul VI audience hall, one of the top energy guzzlers in the sovereign city state. The solar system will be able to provide all the heating, cooling, and lighting needs of the entire building year-round, and any extra electricity generated will be fed back into the Vatican’s grid.

Pier Carlo Cuscianna, head of the Vatican’s department of technical services and mastermind of the project, was inspired by the calls of Pope Benedict XVI and Pope John Paul II to treat the planet with respect and their warnings that global warming will effect the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people.

This isn’t the first time the Vatican has shown leadership on clean energy. In 1999, the entire lighting system of St. Peter’s Basilica was refurbished with energy-efficient lighting, which cut its energy consumption by about 40 percent.

Although Vatican City is not a signatory of the Kyoto Protocol, the Catholic News Service reports that this solar project marks “a major move” to reduce its carbon-footprint and move away from its dependence on Italy’s power grid.

CathNews
Catholic News Service