Articles

Though generally lauded by Catholics, Pope Francis’s encyclical Laudato Si’ (henceforth, LS) was dismissed by some who saw its environmental call to arms as theological novelty.  It’s no surprise then that, when a lightshow of wildlife was projected onto the façade of St. Peter’s basilica in 2015, quite a number of these same voices condemned the display as pagan, blasphemous, and even demonic.  What these critics did not always recognize, however, is that a transformation in Catholic teaching about plants and animals has been underway for a while now; it did not begin with Francis.  Vatican II initiated the environmental revolution, so to speak, and successive popes have furthered it. Not without reason did PETA deem Pope John Paul II a saint to animals or environmentalists nickname Pope Benedict XVI the “green pope.”