There's a point in the new encyclical that I think is quite profound. It's the section in which the Holy Father talks about the ugliness of city life in some modern mega-cities (pp. 44 and 45, and then 150 and 151). In some ways, it seems like an odd juxtaposition; in an encyclical where dire warnings of planet-wide crisis are given, exhortations to build more parks in inner cities seem a little anti-climactic.
But I think there's a deeper point to be made here. I think there is a profound connection between the cultural environment and the impact on the ecosystem that man has. There is a connection between respect for the beauty of dignity of man and respect for the beauty and dignity of the earth.
It's fair to say that the worst environmental disasters so far have occurred in communist or socialist countries. For a great rundown of some of the disastrous highlights of Soviet destruction of the environment, here's a post from The Federalist: http://thefederalist.com/2014/01/13/if-you-think-communism-is-bad-for-people-check-out-what-it-did-to-the-environment/. There are also plenty of links to learn more, and the author also reflects on three reasons he thinks communism resulted in such ecological destruction. But I think he missed an important reason.
When I look at pictures of blasted natural landscapes from Soviet Russia, I find a striking resemblance to Soviet-planned cities, another type of blasted landscape. Here are some great pictures to peruse: http://calvertjournal.com/features/show/2473/suburbs-in-contemporary-russian-visual-culture#.VYllv0ZUR-A. Is it much of a stretch to think that people who create and live in cities such as these wastelands of aesthetics might easily fail to see what's wrong with turning one of the largest seas in the world into a desert wasteland?
I think there is a common idea between ugly Soviet architecture and the wastelands that the Communists created in nature, and I think it is materialism. Materialism rejects the transcendent dimension of existence and focuses only on measurable, material goods. In architecture, this means that efficiency only becomes the rule, while beauty is continually sacrificed. The needs of man are reduced to sustenance and satisfaction of animal needs only--they become so much cattle, rather than full human beings. In the same way, the goods of the Earth become reduced to so much raw material: cities are nothing more than factories of humans, and the goods of the Earth are simply the inputs.
Under materialism, higher goods are not valued; only mundane things are considered real. The transcendent is not revered; only the immanent is considered. The horizon of man having thus been shrunk, it makes sense to me that long foresight--the ability to defer the fulfillment of present desires because of long-term consequences--is also curtailed. So the reckless use of currently available goods of the Earth in such a way as to destroy them, to the detriment of future men, seems much more likely in a materialistic society.
The Holy Father mentions consumerism many times in Laudato Si. I think his point could be broadened and improved somewhat by replacing "consumerism" with "materialism", because I think it is really the materialistic character of consumerism that causes environmental issues. I think doing this replacement connects multiple threads in the argument of the encyclical beautifully, and it explains why so many great ecological disasters have been wrought in explicitly anti-consumerist societies.
The opposite of this sort of materialism is to value beauty and to live with dignity. And I think you can see the power this sort of philosophy can have in the history of American environmental movements.
The United States has a long history of pride in the natural beauty of its land. The beauty of nature has inspired almost religious fervor in many Americans over the years. "America the Beautiful" is essentially our national religious hymn, and many if not most Americans really mean it when they sing it. This fervor for natural beauty expressed itself also in the establishments of many societies for the appreciation of this natural wonder or that natural beauty. John Muir's Sierra Club is probably the most well known of these, but there were countless other local groups or individuals who had similar passions. One great example from many: if you've been to Skyline Caverns in Front Royal, then you've heard the odd, quasi-religious recorded speech from Walter Amos they play for all the tourists at the end of the tour, and you've experienced an example of this peculiarly American piety toward nature.
The enormous popularity of the pastimes of hunting and fishing is another important locus of this natural piety. As pastimes, hunting and fishing are really more about communing with nature than about catching game, so although it may go against some stereotypes of people who don't hunt or fish, the typical hunter or fisher is a nature enthusiast and a lover of the beauty and harmony of the wilds. It was really these people who kickstarted the environmentalist movement in the US, and they did it out of love and respect for the beauty of America. This is why I'm proud to be a member of the Izaac Walton league, even though it does have some obnoxious and incorrect views (specifically, on population control and fracking). In its origins, the League was founded with reverence for the transcendence that is in nature, and I still see that attitude in its current members that I talk to.
It's also worth noting that much of the *real* success America has had in local environmental issues came initially through these grassroots groups: the Clean Water Act, for example, came about because of the Izaac Walton League. The environmental movement in the United States has since been hijacked by radical anti-humanists who are primarily interested in acquiring power at the Federal level in order to fundamentally transform society, but the original environmentalism in America was grassroots, sane, and practical.
And they achieved real change *not* by attempting to force change upon an unwilling populace. Again, the issue of respect for the dignity of man comes into play. A very frequent question you will find on the lips of the radical environmentalists is, how do we get our desired policies into effect, when the people as a whole are against them? Disdain for the stupidity of the masses is rampant in these circles. It really is akin to the old Communist attitude that people are cattle, and that the intellectual elite need to trick or bully them somehow into doing what they know is best for them. This attitude is fully on display, for example, in the German climatologist Schellnhuber, who invented the magical "2 degree C" limit for climate change. There was no science involved in this limit, but after he came up with it, it became accepted fact somehow that we *must* limit global warming to 2 degrees C or less, or disaster would come on the whole world. Schellnhuber frankly admits that this limit was invented as a purely political ploy in order to get the kind of political action he wanted: http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/climate-catastrophe-a-superstorm-for-global-warming-research-a-686697-8.html.
The American experience, however, proves that this approach does not have to be taken. If you can instill a love of beauty, a respect for transcendence, and a desire for dignity in life and in culture, then you can get people to make the right choices for the environment for themselves. So in the end, the health of the human ecology--culture--really does turn out to be of radical importance for the health of the world ecology.
This area of thought is where, in my opinion, all the best moments of the encyclical can be found (chapter 6, for example, on "Sacramental Signs and the Celebration of Rest", is sublimely beautiful). To my mind, the most productive use to which we can put this new Encyclical is to meditate on our culture, and try to find ways to make beauty and dignity things which are more widely cherished.
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