Posted on 06/15/2015 3:10:19 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
It takes a big ego to run for president. How else could you keep a straight face while telling everybody: “I’m the best person in the entire country to be the next president of the United States?”
But if it takes a big ego to fun for president, it takes an even bigger ego to run against — the Pope! Meet Rick Santorum. Desperate to find one issue that separates him from the rest of the Republican pack of clowns, Roman Catholic Santorum has decided to attack Pope Francis for daring to speak out on climate change.
In a radio interview with talk show host Don Giordano, Santorum said the Pope has no business talking about climate change. The Pope would be better off “leaving science to the scientists,” the recurring presidential candidate volunteered, “and focus on what we’re really good on, which is theology and morality.” And, above all, Santorum advised, the Pope should stay out of politics: “When we get involved with political and controversial scientific theories, then I think the church is probably not as forceful and credible.”
A couple of days later, Santorum doubled down, insisting that while it was not OK for the Pope to express his opinion on climate change, it was OK for him, a politician, to do so because: “Politicians, whether we like it or not, people in government have to make decisions with regard to public policy that affect American workers.” Besides, Santorum told Fox News’ Chris Wallace, the Pope had more important things to worry about: “I think there are more pressing problems confronting the earth than climate change.”
To which, we should all shout out: “Pray tell, what? Name one issue that’s more important than climate change!” Santorum’s wrong about this issue on so many levels he should be ashamed to show his face in public. Let’s start with the fact that Pope Francis is, indeed, a scientist. He has a degree in chemistry and worked as a chemist before joining the Jesuits.
Even were he not a scientist, Pope Francis is still on solid ground talking about climate change because it is the most critical environmental issue of our day, and Christians have long considered protection of the environment a moral duty. Taking his cue from the first book of the Bible — Genesis 2:15: “The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it” — the Pope believes God put us on this beautiful planet, not to destroy it, but to protect it for ourselves and future generations.
As a Catholic, Santorum should also know better than to suggest that popes should stick to strictly theoretical or theological issues. In their encyclicals, popes have always talked about controversial issues of the day. Paul VI spoke out against the Vietnam War. Pius XII condemned the Nazi invasion of Hungary. And, perhaps most famously, Leo XIII in Rerum Novarum (1891) affirmed the right of workers to form labor unions and receive a living wage.
Most importantly, Santorum’s wrong to assert that there’s no clear science on global warming. If he refuses to open his eyes and see shrinking glaciers, he might check with the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, which reports that 97 percent of scientists agree that climate change is “unequivocal,” is a serious threat to the planet, and is “very likely” caused mainly by human activity.
Scheduled for release on June 18, the Pope’s encyclical will be entitled “Laudato Si,” or “Praise Be,” a line from the “Canticle of Creatures” by St. Francis of Assisi, the Pope’s patron saint. And it could not come at a better time: just six months before the international conference on climate change in Paris this December, and four months before the Pope’s September 24 address to a Joint Session of Congress.
In it, according to Vatican sources, Pope Francis will argue that the health and beauty of God’s creation is now seriously threatened by climate change — and that action to fight global warming is now a moral imperative for all 1.2 billion Catholics worldwide, and for all people of faith.
And that’s why Rick Santorum doesn’t want the Pope to talk about climate change. Because when he calls climate change “the moral issue of our time” — that means Santorum, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Bobby Jindal, and other climate change deniers are, by definition, immoral. And that’s why Santorum doesn’t want the Pope to talk about climate change. Because now to the list of grievous sins — theft, murder, adultery — will be added: denying climate change. Rick Santorum? Guilty!
AMEN!!! GIMME BENEDICT!!!!
Lived in downtown Seattle for 5 of our BEST years!!! However NO AIR CONDITIONING!! Although PERFECT weather....BLUEST SKIES ANYWHERE....Low Humidity....GLORIOUS.
There MIGHT BE Global Warming....but it’s in GOD’S HANDS!!! HELLO....they tell us Alaska was TROPICAL and that the TROPICS were FROZEN over.....Hello Global Climate Change.
LIBERAL SPIN ENERGY has NEVER helped ANYONE but the LIEBERAL LEADERS....period.
“I’m withholding other comments until the encyclical is actually published and there is a translation by an organization not linked with the left or the MSM.”
Agreed. On a separate, but related note, one could make the case that population growth in Latin America, which is very high, contributes to the environmental issues the Pope is talking about. One could also make the case that instead of being the fault of the developed world, it is the corrupt politics of many Latin American countries, and for some countries - socialism, that have hurt economies and perpetuated poverty.
Is he the evil peter of ‘Rome as predicted in prophecy? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4onhz2zVRQ
Who is immoral here is certainly open to argument, but many will die from the Pope’s advocacy of the global warming scam and enforced privation that will come from the heavy hand of dictatorial governments.
Know what else is immoral? Lying.
This Catholic says to the Pope, “Shut your pie hole!”
I am looking forward to the next Conclave, hopefully really soon.
#50 I am Catholic and also feeling the same sentiment about Francis. Next Conclave Please!
According to this man, the poor of the world have a God given right to the productivity of capitalism, and capitalists are evil. Either God is a pervert or this man is an idiot.
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Popes are immoral.
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Saying that there is any climate change is ignorant and immoral.
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You said: “socialism, that have hurt economies and perpetuated poverty” regarding Latin America and I can only agree with you!
He can take it up with God, who controls it all! Leftist ate pathetic, and religious leftists are the worst.
Climate Change is the big stealth abortion mandate the Pope is in favor.
This is a scheme so as to ration people so the elites will get cheap oil to waste for themselves. They do not want to pay the capitalist price everyone pays.
Another leftist Pope who is for wealth distribution but not price distribution. The elites want the cheap oil for themselves, not paying the capitalistically shared price.
But he's also right. Ironic how the un-Godly get to use a major religion against us.
I cringe when Popes start on about protecting Mother Earth - if they read the dang Bible they would know what God's ultimate plan is and it doesn't include us going extinct due to our destruction of the Earth via glo-bull warming. If Iconic Christian leaders would stick to the Word, it would be most helpful.
Even before Alaska was tropical, the entire planet was frozen. It actually took everything from respiration to tremendous volcanic activity forming Siberia and other continents to end the frost. Snowball Earth was what it was called, and we’re it not for volcanoes pumping up loads of CO2, and other gases, neither us not Dinosaurs would ever have a chance at life. Thank God for volcanoes.
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