16
June 24, 2014
The Valley Catholic
commentary
Sustainability summit links environmental
and social justice
By Dr. Anthony Strawa
Recently the Vatican hosted a summit
of leaders and academics from around
the world, “Sustainable Humanity, Sustainable Nature, Our Responsibility,” a
joint venture of the Pontifical Academy
of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy
and to exercise wise stewardship of its
of Social Sciences.
resources for the benefit of the whole
A joint meeting of scientists and
human family.”
social scientists is unusual and unThe Vatican conference was timely
derscores the growing realization that
indeed. In May the U.S. government reproblems of environmental and ecoleased its comprehensive climate report
nomic justice are interconnected.
that said the effects of human-induced
In the words of the organizers,
climate change are being felt in every
“There is no single environmental probcorner of the United States…with water
lem; there is a large collection of intergrowing scarcer in dry regions, torrelated problems.” One of the goals of
rential rains increasing in wet regions,
the conference was to explore numerous
heat waves becoming more common
ways to view the problems, in terms of
and severe, wildfires growing worse,
population growth, economic growth,
and forests dying under assault from
through urban pollution or poverty.
heat-loving insects.
Dan Misleh, Chair of the Catholic
In June the Obama administration
Climate Covenant, attended as an
launched an initiative that would reobserver. His blog summarizing prequire states to reduce carbon emissions.
sentations from the event can be found
While states are given much latitude
at http:/
/catholicclimatecovenant.org/
in how they meet these goals, legisladans-blog-from-rome/.
tion should insure that the poor and
Some findings of the workshop are
vulnerable are not further affected.
incorporated in excerpts taken from
Environmental and social justice are
the statement of the Joint PAS/PASS
intrinsically intertwined.
Workshop:
• Dr. Anthony Strawa is Chairman of
• “The growth in GDP has been
the Catholic Green Initiative of the Diocese
accompanied by unacceptable gaps
of San Jose. He joined NASA Ames Research
between the rich and the poor, who still
Center in 1987 as an atmospheric scientist.
have no access to most of the advanceHe has taught Environmental Science at
ment of the Era. For example, about 50
Santa Clara University and is a member of
percent of available energy is accessed
the Sunnyvale Green Ribbon Committee.
by just one billion people, yet the negative impacts on the environment are
being felt by the three billion who have
no access to that energy. Three billion
have so little access to modern energy
that they are forced to cook, heat and
light their homes with methods danger• Gay Marriage
ous to their health.”
• “Yet even with the unprecedented
Editor:
scale and intensity of land use, food inWith letters on homosexuality, nusecurity still stalks the planet, with one
merous TV programs featuring it, and
billion people suffering from chronic
its frequent mention in the news, talk
hunger and another billion suffering
shows and print media, I might conclude
from the hidden hunger of micronutrithat a large percentage of Americans are
ent deficiencies. Tragically, a third of the
homosexual. We know, however, that’s
produced food is wasted…”
not the case. While a small percentage
• “Our ec