Pope Francis Endorses Paris Summit for Combating ‘Worrisome Phenomenon of Climate Change’

Climate change demonstrators march to demand curbs to carbon pollution in London on Novemb
LEON NEAL/AFP/Getty

Pope Francis has once again underscored the perils of manmade “climate change,” urging nations to adopt practical measures to counteract its effects.

After his “Angelus” message in Saint Peter’s Square Sunday, the Pope gave a shout-out to the “One Planet Summit” that will take place in Paris this week, voicing his hopes for the summit’s success in fighting climate change.

“Two years after the adoption of the Paris climate agreement,” the summit will renew its commitment and “consolidate a shared strategy to counter the worrisome phenomenon of climate change,” the pontiff stated.

“I strongly hope that this summit, as well as other initiatives that go in the same direction, will foster a clear awareness of the need to adopt genuinely effective measures to counteract climate change and, at the same time, to combat poverty and promote integral human development,” he added.

The Pope also took advantage of the occasion to tie climate change to recent extreme weather events in India and Albania.

“In this context I would like to express my closeness to the Indian populations affected by Cyclone Okhi, especially the families of the many missing fishermen,” Francis said, “and also to the population of Albania, which has been severely tested by major flooding.”

India’s Catholic dioceses in the coastal regions of India’s Tamil Nadu and Kerala states have appealed to the Vatican’s Secretariat for Communication for help, according to reports from Vatican Radio.

Cyclone Okhi caused severe damage to Trivandrum and Kanyakumari districts on Nov. 29, and several hundred fishermen are feared missing. The cyclone originated in the Gulf of Thailand on Nov. 21 and gained intensity as it traversed the northern Indian Ocean.

As Breitbart News reported in October, a number of nations have quietly begun backing away from the Paris energy goals, which are part of the non-binding agreement focusing on carbon dioxide emissions.

According to Lawrence Solomon of Energy Probe, a Toronto-based environmental organization, “most signatories are ignoring, if not altogether abandoning Paris commitments, undoubtedly because voters in large part put no stock in scary global warming scenarios.”

Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau “now stands almost alone in sincere support of Paris,” Solomon wrote. “The populist backlash — a revulsion at top-down governments laden with jet-setting politicians landing in posh places to preach restraint to the masses — has swept America with Trump’s election, Great Britain with Brexit, much of Europe, and Australia.”

“In the process, global warming enthusiasts are being swept out,” he wrote, offering examples from Australia, Germany and Austria.

Australia rejected its Clean Energy Target (CET), a lengthy proposal that would have forced electricity utilities to rely on renewables and other low-emission sources for a substantial percentage of their production. The measure had been put forward as a way of complying with requirements of the non-binding Paris agreement.

The prominent Australian economist Judith Sloan wrote a searing essay in October decrying renewable energy as the greatest “scam” being perpetrated against taxpayers and consumers, greater even than Ponzi, Madoff or Enron.

While sinking enormous financial resources into propping up renewable energy prospectors, national governments are providing no perceptible benefits to their citizens, Sloan wrote.

“With very few exceptions, governments all over the world have fallen into the trap of paying renewable energy scammers on the basis that it is necessary, at least politically, to be seen to be doing something about climate change,” Sloan asserted, as well as furnishing extensive economic data to back up her claim.

Pope Francis has called climate change skepticism “perverse,” while calling skeptics to “ecological conversion.”

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