Good Sense, Good Air: While we live we are responsible to the Lord

On November 7, Bishop Stephen Blaire of Stockton, CA, and chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development, addressed the Christian vocation to cultivate and care for
God’s good gift of Creation in a speech to an ecumenical gathering in Louisville, Kentucky. Bishop Blaire identified how this commitment connects to Catholic concerns for human life and human dignity –
particularly of the poor and vulnerable.

Bishop Blaire said that God’s generous gift of creation demands a response back to God and a duty to steward what God has given to us for the good of all the human family. The bishop highlighted how environmental degradation compromises human life and dignity, especially of the poor and vulnerable. A prime example, he continued, are the adverse impacts which mercury, toxic air pollution and climate change have on human life, particularly on the unborn, in the case of mercury pollution and future generations in the case mercury pollution and future generations in the case of climate change. The full text of his address can be found at http://catholicclimatecovenant.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Bishop-Blaire-November-7-2011.pdf.