Gift Idea

Earth Bags $4.00 @ pick up at SSJ mailroom or add postage for mailing.

Practicing the Principles of the Universe 
as Thomas Berry taught may gradually enhance the evolutionary process within ourselves.
Let us be attentive to the following principles in our daily life.
1. Self-Fulfilling - art, ritual, celebration, cultural celebration, liturgy, spirituality
2. Self-Governing - ethics, animal rights, politics, community development, land trusts
3. Self-Healing - health, toxicity/waste, Earth disease
4. Self-Nourishing - agriculture, food, diet, economics, sustainability
5. Self-Emerging - energy, work, technology, architecture, transportation, housing
6. Self-Educating - schools, alternative education, curriculum
7. Self Propagating - population, women, species habitat, poverty/justice
Steps:
Think about your day. How do I practice these principles? Am I in tune with nature and all other species?
Am I developing a loving harmonious relationship with all that is as I move through my day?
How can I deepen my consciousness about thses principles?

Presentations on Catholic Climate Change Covenant

Presentations by Sister Mary Elizabeth Clark on the Catholic Care for Creation and Climate Change Covenant will take place in the following places.

Tuesday, September 18, 2012
Bethlehem Village
Flourtown, PA
7:00 pm

Tuesday, September 25, 2012
St. John Chrysostom
Stevenson Center Parish Hall
Wallingford, PA
7:00 pm

Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Church of the Holy Apostles
Glen Burnie, MD
6:30 - 7:45 pm

If you would like to schedule a presentation please call 215-248-7289 or email mclark@ssjphila.org.

Dr. James Hansen Reports on Global Warming

You may have read this article in the Washington Post but just in case you didn't, I have it here for you to see. This is one good reason to introduce your faculty, parish or staff to the Catholic Climate Change Covenant. Sister Mary Elizabeth Clark, an ambassador of the Catholic Climate Change Coalition is available to make a presentation from a Catholic perspective on global climate change. Contact 215-248-7289, mclark@ssjphila.org for a presentation.

 

 

Published on Sunday, August 5, 2012 by The Washington Post

Climate Change is Here — and Worse Than We Thought

NASA's James Hansen, the 'Godfather of Global Warming,' says earlier predictions "too optimistic"

by James Hansen

When I testified before the Senate in the hot summer of 1988 , I warned of the kind of future that climate change would bring to us and our planet. I painted a grim picture of the consequences of steadily increasing temperatures, driven by mankind’s use of fossil fuels.
But I have a confession to make: I was too optimistic.
My projections about increasing global temperature have been proved true. But I failed to fully explore how quickly that average rise would drive an increase in extreme weather.
... our analysis shows that, for the extreme hot weather of the recent past, there is virtually no explanation other than climate change.

In a new analysis of the past six decades of global temperatures, which will be published Monday, my colleagues and I have revealed a stunning increase in the frequency of extremely hot summers, with deeply troubling ramifications for not only our future but also for our present.
This is not a climate model or a prediction but actual observations of weather events and temperatures that have happened. Our analysis shows that it is no longer enough to say that global warming will increase the likelihood of extreme weather and to repeat the caveat that no individual weather event can be directly linked to climate change. To the contrary, our analysis shows that, for the extreme hot weather of the recent past, there is virtually no explanation other than climate change.
The deadly European heat wave of 2003, the fiery Russian heat wave of 2010 and catastrophic droughts in Texas and Oklahoma last year can each be attributed to climate change. And once the data are gathered in a few weeks’ time, it’s likely that the same will be true for the extremely hot summer the United States is suffering through right now.
These weather events are not simply an example of what climate change could bring. They are caused by climate change. The odds that natural variability created these extremes are minuscule, vanishingly small. To count on those odds would be like quitting your job and playing the lottery every morning to pay the bills.
Twenty-four years ago, I introduced the concept of “climate dice” to help distinguish the long-term trend of climate change from the natural variability of day-to-day weather. Some summers are hot, some cool. Some winters brutal, some mild. That’s natural variability.
But as the climate warms, natural variability is altered, too. In a normal climate without global warming, two sides of the die would represent cooler-than-normal weather, two sides would be normal weather, and two sides would be warmer-than-normal weather. Rolling the die again and again, or season after season, you would get an equal variation of weather over time.
An clean energy economy ... is a simple, honest and effective solution.
But loading the die with a warming climate changes the odds. You end up with only one side cooler than normal, one side average, and four sides warmer than normal. Even with climate change, you will occasionally see cooler-than-normal summers or a typically cold winter. Don’t let that fool you.
Our new peer-reviewed study, published by the National Academy of Sciences, makes clear that while average global temperature has been steadily rising due to a warming climate (up about 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit in the past century), the extremes are actually becoming much more frequent and more intense worldwide.
When we plotted the world’s changing temperatures on a bell curve, the extremes of unusually cool and, even more, the extremes of unusually hot are being altered so they are becoming both more common and more severe.
The change is so dramatic that one face of the die must now represent extreme weather to illustrate the greater frequency of extremely hot weather events.
Such events used to be exceedingly rare. Extremely hot temperatures covered about 0.1 percent to 0.2 percent of the globe in the base period of our study, from 1951 to 1980. In the last three decades, while the average temperature has slowly risen, the extremes have soared and now cover about 10 percent of the globe.
This is the world we have changed, and now we have to live in it — the world that caused the 2003 heat wave in Europe that killed more than 50,000 people and the 2011 drought in Texas that caused more than $5 billion in damage. Such events, our data show, will become even more frequent and more severe.
There is still time to act and avoid a worsening climate, but we are wasting precious time. We can solve the challenge of climate change with a gradually rising fee on carbon collected from fossil-fuel companies, with 100 percent of the money rebated to all legal residents on a per capita basis. This would stimulate innovations and create a robust clean-energy economy with millions of new jobs. It is a simple, honest and effective solution.
The future is now. And it is hot.

© 2012 The Washington Post

Faith-Based Environmental Efforts Recognized

Grid, Philadelphia's sustainability magazine, has just published a good article that reports on Eco-Religious efforts in the Philadelphia area. There is a feature on the last page about Mary Elizabeth Clark, SSJ, Director of the SSJ Earth Center's efforts as well as the rest of the Philadelphia Religious Institutions efforts.


To View the article go to http://www.gridphilly.com/digital-edition/march-2012-035.html, the article is on page 47.

EPA Hearing Commentary

The Following is a commentary in which Mar Elizabeth Clark, SSJ, presented at an EPA Hearing on January 19, 2012.


Docket # EPS-HQ-OAR-2010-0799

My name is Sister Mary Elizabeth Clark. I am a Sister of Saint Joseph of Philadelphia, PA and an ambassador of the U.S. Catholic Bishops Climate Change Coalition. I minister at Chestnut Hill College as assistant to the president for sustainability and as director of the Earth Center. Working with many other people of faith, I am here to urge you to keep an ethical, moral perspective as a lens for your deliberations.

Thank you for this opportunity to speak to you.

As people of religious faith, we believe that the atmosphere that supports life on earth is a God-given gift, one we must respect and protect. It unites us as one human family. If we harm the atmosphere, we dishonor our Creator and the gift of creation. The values of our faith call us to humility, sacrifice, and a respect for life and the natural gifts God has provided.

As the U.S. Bishops said in 2001:

"At its core, global climate change is not about economic theory or political platforms, nor about partisan advantage or interest group pressures. It is about the future of God's creation and the one human family. It is about protecting both the human environment and the natural environment" (Global Climate Change: A Plea for Dialogue Prudence and the Common Good, A Statement of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, June 15, 2001).

Since I am representing those who see this issue from a faith perspective, I want to be clear that I trust the Sierra Club and its scientific expertise. From their research I believe this regulation to be the single biggest step in our country to tackle global warming, and therefore, I urge you to accept the President’s proposal without loopholes.

For more than 14 billion years, our Planet Earth has sustained itself and life as we know it. In my own lifetime, I have experienced an appalling growth in our dependency on oil—and the consequences of so much use of it. From the millions of tons of plastics filling landfills to the polluting burning of fossil fuels beyond our imagining, we have built a relationship with oil similar to an addict’s with his abused substance. As a result, our precious Earth cannot continue to sustain life as we know it.

How irresponsible of us humans if we allow this to happen! Earth is a sacred trust given to us by the Creator. As people of faith, we see this as a moral tragedy. There are ways we can diminish the effects of our polluting the air by reducing gas emissions now. What can we say to the next generations if, knowing what we know, we refuse to do it?

As we take personal and communal actions in our places of worship to mitigate the effects of global climate change, it is not possible to make a significant difference without your taking the necessary systemic action in our federal government. We call on you as our federal protection to approve the proposal of President Obama.

The amount suggested by the President is not enough. It is a beginning—a necessary beginning. Please think carefully about the consequences of your decisions. By the year 2030, the proposed standards would cut annual oil consumption by nearly 23 billion gallons, roughly equivalent to the U.S. imports from Saudi Arabia and Iraq in 2010. Although we need to do more, how can we not do the minimum?