There is a giant step the people of God can take next weekend to benefit the Earth’s climate. It’s simple, easy, everyone is capable of doing it and, best of all, it involves doing less not more. I’m not a climate scientist but I know this: if 70 million U.S. Catholics embraced Pope Francis’ encyclical, “Laudato Si’ ” (On care of creation) and honored the Lord’s Day by following the third commandment, we’d see a dramatic drop in greenhouse gases.
We don’t have a lot of time: The Guardian reported that 2021 ocean temperatures were the hottest in history. We all want to do something, but the problem is so big we lose heart. Recycling doesn’t stir the soul. And technology will not keep the immense Thwaites Glacier, a glacier the size of England, from breaking away into a warming Antarctic Ocean.
So, what can one person do? Not much, but 70 million U.S. Catholics could make a difference on the Sabbath, greatly reducing carbon in the atmosphere by literally doing less. If you’re waiting for God to save us, you’re too late. He told us how by writing it with his finger on a stone tablet several thousand years ago.
What would honoring the Sabbath look like?
— Worship and prayer, as usual.
— No shopping. With human lives at stake, is it so difficult to only shop six days?
— No driving. Hedges & Company reports about 1.446 billion vehicles on Earth in 2022 with 19 percent in the United States. Where possible, use public transport. Prohibiting commercial vehicles on Sundays would have a great impact. Is there a good reason we can’t walk, bike, bus or share rides to church?
—No work, except essential services. God gave clear instructions:
So, God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested … Gen 2:3.
—Recreation, spend time with family and friends while reducing car use.
Yes, this would disrupt the economy. So, do we disrupt the economy or destroy our common home? And, yes, we need to look at all human activities that cause damage but let’s start by honoring the Sabbath, creating a powerful, inspiring, beginning.
Embracing the Sabbath would help create a real time of rest from this weary world, a time for inward journeying, enabling us to more easily break into music and become joyful.
Something is very wrong and there isn’t much one person can do to reduce the threat, but if 70 million Catholics heard Pope Francis’ words in “Laudato Si’ ” and honored the Sabbath, we might all break into music and bring joy to our Mother Earth. And all it requires is that we do less — but do it together one day each week.
Weiss is a parishioner of St. Charles Borromeo Church in Arlington and the author of “Touching The Rainbow Ground: Eight Steps To Hope,” a memoir of his 30-year ministry to children in the Americas.
The Good Shepherd