Pope condemns climate change doomsayers?

It's funny how a person can write something, and others read only the things that interest them. Take for instance the press today reporting that the Pope condemns the climate change prophets.

To read this article one would think that the Pope primarily wrote about global warming:

"It is important for assessments in this regard to be carried out prudently, in dialogue with experts and people of wisdom, uninhibited by ideological pressure to draw hasty conclusions, and above all with the aim of reaching agreement on a model of sustainable development capable of ensuring the well-being of all while respecting environmental balances.

"If the protection of the environment involves costs, they should be justly distributed, taking due account of the different levels of development of various countries and the need for solidarity with future generations.

"Prudence does not mean failing to accept responsibilities and postponing decisions; it means being committed to making joint decisions after pondering responsibly the road to be taken."

Efforts to protect the environment should seek "agreement on a model of sustainable development capable of ensuring the well-being of all while respecting environmental balances", the Pope said.

The truth is that while global warming was a major subject of the speech, the press seems to have missed that it was couched in a bigger message of Peace and the Human Family.

Far be it for me to suggest that those subjects just aren't sexy for the press.

Let's look at the text of Benedict XVI's Message for the 41st World Day of Peace. The Day falls on January 1, 2008, and has as its theme: "The Human Family, a Community of Peace" - even the title suggests that the press only got half of the message.

"The natural family, as an intimate communion of life and love, based on marriage between a man and a woman, constitutes 'the primary place of humanization for the person and society and a 'cradle of life and love.' The family is therefore rightly defined as the first natural society, 'a divine institution that stands at the foundation of life of the human person as the prototype of every social order'."

After highlighting the fact that "the family is the first and indispensable teacher of peace," the Holy Father recalls that it is also "the foundation of society ... because it enables its members in decisive ways to experience peace. It follows that the human community cannot do without the service provided by the family."

Of course, the press must think all this just boring dribble, since there is hardly a mention anywhere that the Pope is once again talking about marriage and family as basic pillars of society.

"The family, since it has the duty of educating its members, is the subject of specific rights. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which represents a landmark of juridic civilization of truly universal value, states that 'the family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.' ... The denial or even the restriction of the rights of the family, by obscuring the truth about man, threatens the very foundations of peace," writes the Pope.

"Consequently," the Pope adds, "whoever, even unknowingly, circumvents the institution of the family undermines peace in the entire community, national and international, since he weakens what is in effect the primary agency of peace. ... Everything that serves to weaken the family based on the marriage of a man and a woman, everything that directly or indirectly stands in