II. WHAT HAVE WE DONE TO THE EARTH?

Damage to the environment affects every part of creation. Hardly a day goes by without some mention of these matters by radio, television and newspapers. For many people, this volume of information can be bewildering, since the issues are so wide-ranging, and many do not, at first sight, concern us here in England and Wales. The problems can be grouped into four main areas.

Damage to the earth’s life-sustaining mechanisms
The natural world is made up of many different delicate and intricately interconnected cycles that have nurtured and sustained life for millions of years, giving fertile soil, clean water and a pure atmosphere. Now these life sustaining mechanisms are breaking down through pollution and abuse. In many places fresh water once teeming with life is dead, beautiful coasts have been turned into sewers, fertile soil lies barren or has turned into desert. Forests, often described as the lungs of the earth, are reduced to wasteland, and cities are choked with smog. Emissions of ‘greenhouse gases’ continue to affect the atmosphere in ways that threaten the balance of life on the planet. The resulting climate change could severely disrupt the lives of all of humankind.

Depletion of the world’s natural resources
Our wealth and our way of life depend on the raw materials that are earth’s gifts to us. Everything we produce and consume derives from these raw materials. Yet

these finite resources are being exploited as if they remained available in infinite quantities. In the last forty years of the twentieth century, world consumption of metals, minerals and other materials more than doubled. Scarcities arising from the depletion of non-renewable natural resources threaten international stability as well as those who immediately depend on them.

The impact on the world’s poor
Environmental destruction and social injustice often go hand-in-hand. Damage to the environment will almost certainly affect the poor most of all, since poor communities inevitably inhabit the worst and most vulnerable locations. What is more, 80% of the world’s resources are commandeered by the richest 20% of the world’s population. In other words, we in affluent countries take far more than our fair share of the world’s goods. Much of our consumption becomes waste almost immediately. Meanwhile, 20% of humanity remains destitute, lacking even the basic necessities of clean water, adequate food, shelter and clothing.

One key principle of Catholic social teaching is that of the ‘universal destination of material goods? In the fourth century, the great bishop St Ambrose, citing the Gospel of Luke, wrote as follows:

If God’s providence bestows an unfailing supply of food on the birds of the air who neither sow nor reap, we ought to realise that the reason for people’s supply running short is human greed. The fruits of the earth were given to feed