U.S. Catholics Ready to Execute Pope’s ‘Marching Orders’ on Climate Change (Video)

    Joseph Kurtz, right, who is the archbishop of Louisville, Ky., and the president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, with Cardinal Donald Wuerl, the archbishop of Washington, briefing the news media on Pope Francis’ encyclical on the environment. (Cliff Owen / AP)

Leaders of the Catholic Church in the United States described Pope Francis’ encyclical as “marching orders” for them to pressure Congress and the White House to take swift and decisive action to prevent catastrophic climate change.

The Guardian reports:

The high-level meetings offered a first glimpse of a vast and highly organised effort by the leadership of America’s nearly 80 million Catholics to turn the pope’s moral call for action into reality.

“It is our marching orders for advocacy,” Joseph Kurtz, the president of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Archbishop of Louisville, said. “It really brings about a new urgency for us.”

Representatives of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops said they would hold two briefings for members of Congress on Thursday and visit the White House on Friday to promote and explain the pope’s environmental message.

Those efforts will get a new injection of urgency, when the pope delivers a much-anticipated address to Congress during his visit to the US in September, church leaders said.

Leaders of other religions got involved in the push. More than 300 rabbis signed a letter calling on Jewish institutions and people to divest from “carbon Pharaohs” or coal-based electric power, and invest their money in renewable electricity instead.

Read more here.

Democracy Now! reported Thursday of the pope’s encyclical:

— Posted by Alexander Reed Kelly.