Theology and theEnvironment
Four key themes
David Cloutier, Mount St. Mary’s University
Why the environment?
“Everything is connected to everythingelse”
Lumen Gentium
Universal call to holiness
Universal call to holiness
“the faithful must…acknowledge the inner nature and thevalue of the whole of creation and its orientation to thepraise of God.” (no. 36)
“worshipping everywhere by their holy actions, the laityconsecrate the world itself to God.” (no. 34)
Theme 1: Beautiful order
Creation as an ordered whole
Gift from God
All creatures have a vocation to God
Theme 2: The Challenge of possessions
“Superdevelopment”
Universal destination of goods
Theme 3: Technocratic paradigm
Men and women have constantly intervened in nature, but for a longtime this meant being in tune with and respecting the possibilitiesoffered by the things themselves. It was a matter of receiving whatnature itself allowed, as if from its own hand.
Now, by contrast, we are the ones to lay our hands on things,attempting to extract everything possible from them while frequentlyignoring or forgetting the reality in front of us.
Human beings and material objects no longer extend a friendly handto one another; the relationship has become confrontational.
Theme 3: Technocratic paradigm
“Technology is not neutral”
Limits for human living set by technology,not human nature
Technological choices really “decisionsabout the kind of society we want to build”
Theme 4: Spiritual development/sin
Education (=overcome sins of ignorance)
Conversion (=overcome sins of malice)
Sobriety and humility/restraint (=overcome sins ofpassion)
Words make worlds
Different ways of speaking are integral todifferent ways of seeing
Questions for application
1. How do we see concern for the environment and concern for the poor asone and the same problem? And what apparent challenges do we face inmaking this connection?
2. How do businesses combat the overall perspective of a “throwawayculture” or a “culture of waste”? What social structures need to bechallenged?
3. How do EoC businesses already pay attention to appropriate scale andappropriate speed in their work? How do these then support the key values ofLaudato Si?