Cardinal Warning
Sept 09, 2004
During our interview the Cardinal talks about the relationship between our problems of waste disposal, obesity and alcohol abuse which are symptomatic of our affluent society, and compares these to the starvation and lack of educational facilities and medicines in so much of the developing world.
(belfasttelegraph.co.uk, 21 August 2004) There is a crisis of major importance facing humanity, and we are extraordinarily slow to listen to the warnings and to take appropriate action," says Cardinal Daly, the Emeritus Catholic Archbishop of Armagh.
He continues: "There has been a whole series of reports about the state of the Earth's environment and the relentless depreciation of our non-renewable resources, including something as basic as water.
"There is also a crisis beginning to affect us concerning the price of oil and about the possible exhaustion of our energy resources, and we are doing extraordinarily little, nationally or internationally, to combat it."
The Cardinal was talking at his home in south Belfast this week prior to the launch on Monday at Queen's University of his latest book, The Minding of Planet Earth.
Published by Veritas, the book by this eminent Irish theologian examines the whole relationship between faith and science, and he questions the idea that scientific and traditional Christian perspectives are fundamentally in conflict.
He argues strongly for the complementarity of faith and reason, and also presents a passionate case for social justice, pointing out that the care for the earth and its people is not a new idea but an ongoing truth of Christianity.
He also argues that Ireland's rich spiritual tradition provides a unique resource for the growing task of responding to world poverty and injustice.
During our interview he talks about the relationship between our problems of waste disposal, obesity and alcohol abuse which are symptomatic of our affluent society, and compares these to the starvation and lack of educational facilities and medicines in so much of the developing world.
He emphasises " Some 800 million people in the southern hemisphere do not have enough to eat, and occasionaly we are reminded of this through the media. But it is a way of life and death for millions of our fellow human beings."
Cardinal Daly is critical of a number of aspects of our lifestyle. "We have the shocking problems of the illegal dumping of waste, sometimes transported across the border and left in Northern Ireland.
"There is the suspicion that this is closely linked to criminal gangs, including ex-paramilitaries and even paramilitary organisations themselves."
The problem of litter, he believes, is symptomatic of our "throw-away lifestyles. We consume too much and we waste too much, and litter gives our towns and cities, including Belfast, a bad name.
This in turn rebounds on us, because it affects the tourist economy and takes money out of people's pockets."
He recalls that one of the cleanest cities he ever visted was Singapore. "There were swingeing fines for the slightest offence of littering, which wes regarded as a very serious matter.
" This certainly affected peoples' attitudes.
I am not saying that we should introduce such extreme measures here, but certainly something needs to be done to help change our attitudes and behaviour on this island."
One of the answers, he feels, is to try to eliminate wastefulness from all parts of ur behaviour. "There is excess in our drinking, in our eating and in our shopping.
" It is up to each one of us to ask ourselves' In what area of my life am I guilty of wastefulness, and what should I do about it?' "
Cardinal Daly at 87 is a little more frail than in previous years, but he remains as sharp-minded and as socially-conscious as ever. It seems strange, however, to hear this most articulate of churchmen talking passionately about the major problems of the environment, after being so used to listening to him making regular and important statements about the Troubles in Northern Ireland.
Though he has been aware of environmental problems for many years, and has read around the subject for a long time, he wrote his latest book during the past year. After so much concentration on our own troubles, his is a timely warning.
He says, significantly "I believe that there will not be a return to the full-scale violence of the past years, and that the Troubles are on the way out. A political settlement is now increasingly possible, and indeed inevitable.
"We simply have to find a way of living peacefully together and of co-operating, and leaving the longer-term future to the evolution of democratic politics, without compromising the constitutional positions of the two main communities."
However, there are on-going concerns for all of us. "I believe that to some extent we have been distracted from the major problems of the environment and of ecology by our concentration on our domestic issues and the historic divisions between our two communities.
However in the long-term there are major environmental and ecological problems facing everyone on this island and on this planet, and we would do well to recognise that."
Cardinal Warning