There once was a Pope called The Green Pope.    
      
   He earned the title from both the religious and the secular alike,   
   because he wrote frequently about the environment and asked all   
   Catholics to be better stewards of Gods creation.     
      
   Under this popes pontificate, the Vatican became the worlds first   
   sovereign state to become carbon-neutral, meaning that all of the small   
   countrys greenhouse gas emissions are offset by renewable energies and   
   carbon credits, thanks to extra trees and solar panels. He also made use   
   of a more energy efficient, partially electric popemobile.    
      
   No, The Green Pope is not Pope Francis.    
      
   Its his predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI, which may come as a surprise to   
   those who believe Benedicts legacy was his staunch conservatism.     
      
   During the World Day of Peace celebration in 2010, Pope Benedict XVI   
   chose the theme If You Want to Cultivate Peace, Protect Creation.   
      
   We are all responsible for the protection and care of the environment,   
   he said.    
      
   Drawing on the wisdom from his own predecessors, including Pope John   
   Paul II, Pope Leo XIII and Pope Paul VI, Benedict in his message   
   implored his flock to view climate change and care for creation as an   
   extension of the Churchs care for humanity. He also addressed the   
   phenomenon of environmental refugees several years before Francis noted   
   the environments contribution to the current refugee crisis.    
      
   Can we remain indifferent before the problems associated with such   
   realities as climate change, desertification, the deterioration and loss   
   of productivity in vast agricultural areas, the pollution of rivers and   
   aquifers, the loss of biodiversity, the increase of natural catastrophes   
   and the deforestation of equatorial and tropical regions? Can we   
   disregard the growing phenomenon of environmental refugees, people who   
   are forced by the degradation of their natural habitat to forsake it   
   and often their possessions as well  in order to face the dangers and   
   uncertainties of forced displacement? Can we remain impassive in the   
   face of actual and potential conflicts involving access to natural   
   resources? Benedict asked in his message.    
      
   All these are issues with a profound impact on the exercise of human   
   rights, such as the right to life, food, health and development, he   
   added.    
      
   This was not the only time Pope Benedict addressed the environment and   
   climate change. In Sydney in 2008, he told the young people of World   
   Youth Day in his opening remarks that care for creation and care for   
   humanity are interconnected.    
      
   The concerns for non-violence, sustainable development, justice and   
   peace, and care for our environment are of vital importance for   
   humanity. They cannot, however, be understood apart from a profound   
   reflection on the innate dignity of every human life from conception to   
   natural death: a dignity conferred by God himself and thus inviolable,   
   he said.    
      
   He even managed to work the topic into his 2007 apostolic exhortation   
   Sacramentum Caritatis, on the topic of Eucharist as the source and   
   summit of the life and mission of the Church.    
      
   In the letter, in a section entitled The sanctification of the world and   
   the protection of creation, Pope Benedict XVI noted that even the   
   liturgy reminds the faithful of the importance of Gods creation when the   
   priest raises to God a prayer of blessing and petition over the bread   
   and wine, fruit of the earth, fruit of the vine and work of human hands,   
   he wrote.    
      
   With these words, the rite not only includes in our offering to God all   
   human efforts and activity, but also leads us to see the world as God's   
   creation, which brings forth everything we need for our sustenance. The   
   world is not something indifferent, raw material to be utilized simply   
   as we see fit. Rather, it is part of God's good plan, in which all of us   
   are called to be sons and daughters in the one Son of God, Jesus Christ,   
   he added.     
      
   His writings on the topic were so prolific and profound that he is   
   quoted numerous times in Pope Francis environmental encyclical, Laudato   
   Si.    
      
   Like Benedict and his other papal predecessors, Pope Francis noted that   
   an ecology of the environment was directly related to a proper human   
   ecology.    
      
   There can be no renewal of our relationship with nature without a   
   renewal of humanity itself. There can be no ecology without an adequate   
   anthropology. When the human person is considered as simply one being   
   among others, the product of chance or physical determinism, then our   
   overall sense of responsibility wanes, Pope Francis wrote in Laudato Si,   
   quoting Benedict XVI.    
      
   Care for creation, or for our common home, as Francis often calls it,   
   will most likely continue to be one of the primary concerns of his   
   pontificate. Besides his encyclical, Pope Francis frequently speaks   
   about climate change and the environment in various audiences, including   
   when he became the first pope to address the United States Congress last   
   fall.    
      
   But the important intellectual and practical groundwork laid by his   
   predecessors, and particularly by Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, cannot be   
   overlooked.    
      
      
   This article was originally published Oct. 11, 2016.   
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
      
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