Jeb Bush responded to the Pope’s Encyclical at a town hall meeting after it was released. He said, “I don’t get economic policy from my bishops or my cardinals or from my pope. I think religion ought to be about making us better as people, and not about getting into the political realm.” Rick Santorum did Jeb one better and said that he was more qualified to make a judgement on climate change than His Holiness. Greg Gutfeld, a talking head for the show ‘Fox and Friends,’ said that Pope Francis was a malthusian and had a “Marxist background.”
Needless to say, the political reaction from the right is unsurprising. Conservatives worldwide have consistently been skeptical of climate change. In fact, less than half of Republican Roman Catholics in the U.S. believe in human cause climate change; that, compared to 80% of Democrat Catholics that do. As Taylor pointed out, the encyclical was long, and we don't usually think about morality in terms of changing how we use technology. By the way, its obvious that Mr. Gutfeld did not even take the time to read the Encyclical, since the Pope specifically denounces any view that argues populations controls need to be put in place to solve the problem, something Malthus would never say--hopefully Mr. Gutfeld takes Taylor's advice to read the Encyclical for himself.
It’s hardly surprising that the Encyclical, which is largely a message of unity which calls into question ecological practices that hurt the poorest among us, would divide politics. The energy sector provided over $69 billion last year in campaign contribution to GOP candidates. In Poland, where coal is a primary industry, conservatives are lashing out, worried that cutting off coal could upset their economy and political position. In retaliation, they are telling the Pope to stay out of politics, science, and economics, and stay in the realm of morality.
However, that is exactly what Pope Francis is doing. In the Encyclical, he says, “It is also the mindset of those who say: Let us allow the invisible forces of the market to regulate the economy, and consider their impact on society and nature as collateral damage.” In his theology we are called to be caretakers of the creation we are apart, but our current economic and political epistemology sets us above nature, and so we dominate it rather than nurture it. In fact, the topic of poverty is inseparable from politics and economics!
Indeed, world politics has been consumed with self-interest, and we do desperately need the cultural revolution Pope Francis calls for in his Encyclical. It is easy to see how shallow the morality politics of the modern right in the U.S. have become when they denounce a biblical ecology that is foundational to any theology. As Calvin remarked, “Wherever you look, there is no part of the world however small that does not show some glimmer of beauty…The superb structure of the world acts as a sort of mirror in which we may see God.”
As Taylor beautifully illustrates, the problem is not with coal or oil, it is with our humanity. So no, Mr. Bush, when economics is the cause of suffering for creation, the Pope’s call is about making us all better stewards.
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