Climate Change

The Sisters of St. Dominic are deeply concerned about climate change and have consistently provided educational materials and encouraged actions to address this issue. In 2015, our Congregation affirmed a corporate stance on climate change. This corporate stance, mutually shared by the congregations within the Dominican Sisters in Committed Collaboration (Amityville, Blauvelt, Caldwell, Hope, Sparkill), recognizes that climate change encompasses all other issues impacting our daily lives. It is critical that we take the necessary steps to support legislation that will decrease climate change as well as make personal and community choices that will eliminate the effects of climate change for ourselves and especially for the disadvantaged in society.

Pope Francis, in his encyclical, Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home, reinforces this emphasis on climate as a common good:

23 The climate belongs to everyone and is a complex system linked to what is needed to sustain human life.  A “solid scientific consensus” has emerged that human activity has contributed significantly to the general warming of the planet. . . it is now undeniable that our dependence on fossil fuels triggers a large increase in greenhouse gases. . . .

24  Potable water supplies decrease; agricultural output is reduced; water levels rise on our coasts; polar ice caps melt, producing increased methane gas.

25 The poor will be affected by these climate changes more than the rich are.  Nearly two-thirds of all people on earth live along the coastlines.  These changes adversely affect farming, fishing, and forestry, the means of livelihood of most poor people on earth.  The poor are forced t follow the migrations of animals and move away as deserts expand.  They must leave behind their homes and live with even greater insecurity.  How can we be indifferent to them?

26  We need an urgent plan to drastically reduce polluting gases and increase access to renewable energy.