Skip to footer

Vatican cardinal, Orthodox theologian, and atheist scientist to give papal presser

The document will be released Thursday at an news conference featuring a Vatican cardinal, a Greek Orthodox theologian and an atheist scientist.

|
Gregorio Borgia/AP
Pope Francis delivers his message to participants of Rome's diocese convention in St. Peter's Square, at the Vatican, Sunday. Francis engaged in some self-promotion during his weekly blessing, alerting the thousands of people in St. Peter's Square that his first solo encyclical is coming out on Thursday and inviting them to pay attention to environmental degradation around them.
  • By Associated Press

| VATICAN CITY

Pope Francis is looking for a global audience for his upcoming encyclical on the environment, saying Sunday it's meant for everyone, not just Catholics.

Francis engaged in some self-promotion during his weekly blessing, alerting the thousands of people in St. Peter's Square that his first solo encyclical is coming out on Thursday and inviting them to pay attention to environmental degradation around them.

"This encyclical is aimed at everyone: Let us pray that everyone can receive its message and grow in responsibility toward the common home that God has given us," he said.

The eagerly awaited document will be launched at a Vatican news conference Thursday that underscores Francis' insistence that it's not just for Catholics: The three speakers are a Vatican cardinal, a Greek Orthodox theologian and an atheist scientist.

In the encyclical, Francis is expected to lay out the moral imperative to fight global warming, since the poor are the most affected by it.

Francis has said he wanted to get the encyclical out in plenty of time before negotiators meet in Paris at the end of the year to hammer out a deal to reduce greenhouse gases to a level that keeps global warming below 2 degrees C (3.6 F), compared with pre-industrial times.

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Vatican cardinal, Orthodox theologian, and atheist scientist to give papal presser
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/2015/0615/Vatican-cardinal-Orthodox-theologian-and-atheist-scientist-to-give-papal-presser
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe