In a scathing letter released on Wednesday, Pope Francis issued his sharpest statement to date against the escalating climate problem, placing the blame squarely on the shoulders of major corporations, world leaders, and “irresponsible” Western lifestyles.
The pontiff stated in a 7,000-word encyclical titled Laudate Deum (“Praise God”) that “our responses haven’t been adequate, whereas the world in which we live is falling apart and may be approaching the breaking point.”
In his essay, he stated that “some effects of the climate crisis have become irreversible, at least for several hundred years,” such as the rise in ocean temperature, acidification, and oxygen depletion.
The pope harshly criticized those who delay or deny climate warming.
“Despite all efforts to downplay, gloss over, ignore, or relativize the problem, the effects of climate change are already visible and getting worse. The fact that we have recently experienced extreme weather occurrences, repeated periods of unusually high temperatures, drought, and other shouts of protest cannot be ignored, he stated.
Ignoring it will increase “the probability of severe phenomena that are becoming more frequent and intense,” he warned, and climate change is expected to only become worse.
The pope focused in particular on the wealthy nations’ disproportionate contribution to climate change.
“We can state that a broad change in the irresponsible lifestyle associated with the Western model would have a significant long-term impact,” he wrote. “If we consider that emissions per individual in the United States are approximately two times greater than those of individuals living in China, and approximately seven times greater than the average of the poorest countries.
He also criticized business leaders and organizations for prioritizing short-term advantages and profits over climate action. Unfortunately, the great economic powers, whose concern is with the largest profit possible at the lowest cost and in the shortest amount of time, are not precisely interested in the climate issue.
In his critique of “certain dismissive and hardly reasonable opinions that I encounter, even within the Catholic Church,” he even made reference to his own church.
The pope’s message is a follow-up to his 2015 encyclical Laudato Si (“Praised Be To You”), which was the first pontifical text ever entirely dedicated to ecological challenges and has been a cornerstone of his papacy.
It takes place before the UN COP28 climate conference, which begins at the end of November in Dubai and will serve as a “global stocktake” of nations’ progress toward achieving climate targets.