Wednesday, January 07, 2015

Climate Change in Minneapolis



-6 below 0 at 11:00AM.  -28 below windchill... warming up from -35 below.

Too sinful to feel it though.

What?

Song for this post here.

5 comments:

  1. Hm, let me try this again. I cannot imagine those temps. It will be 17 tonight, and I do not own enough layers of clothes for 17. I'm sure an apocalyptic-type event will happen in a few hours.

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    1. It sounds worse than it is - unless of course you have no heat - then it is deadly.

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    2. There's a reason they used to wear night caps.

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  2. Im open to the idea of climate change, though I am skeptical on some aspects. I am thinking sin causes more disruption than chemicals dispensed into the air. Having said that I had heard a story once that while St. John Vianny was Cure in Ars the weather was good always, but when he died it went back to normal. Have you heard this as well or is it just hearsay?

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    1. I've not read that about the Cure - it may be true since the people became devout and did penance. OL of La Salette told the children the famine was a punishment for blasphemy and the desecration of Sunday, reminding them that the people cursed when the potatoes rotted and so on. There was obvious climate change in those years. I know that sounds naive and simplistic - too pious.

      I'm with you, I also accept there is climate change, that it is natural but also that man has disrupted the environment through excess consumption - the clearing of the air for the Olympics in China is an example. The islands of plastic in the oceans is another. The earthquakes probably generated by frakking, and clearing natural habitat and forests is another issue, and so on. We consume and waste much, while people elsewhere in the world suffer.

      I have no idea what the Pope's encyclical will say, but I am glad he will be addressing the issue from the perspective of the Gospel - both JPII and Benedict XVI mentioned the same concerns but never addressed the issue directly. A Catholic perspective is badly needed. I trust the Pope will cover human ecology as well - as Pope Benedict discussed:

      "Our duties towards the environment are linked to our duties towards the human person, considered in himself and in relation to others. It would be wrong to uphold one set of duties while trampling on the other. Herein lies a grave contradiction in our mentality and practice today: one which demeans the person, disrupts the environment, and damages society." — Caritas in Veritate, (par. 51).

      Hopefully people will wait for the encyclical before tearing into Pope Francis. If I remember correctly, people weren't always happy with what Benedict wrote and said about these matters either.

      God bless!

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