On a trip to Indonesia in early September, 2024, Pope Francis signed a declaration on religious harmony and environmental protection at the Istiqlal mosque in Jakarta with the mosque’s grand imam. The Pope said that our species was facing a “serious crisis” bought about by war and the destruction of the environment.[1] Of war, the tremendous destruction of civilian infrastructure in Ukraine and Gaza that had been taking place was doubtless on the cleric’s mind. Of the environment, climate change was undoubtedly on his mind. In addition to volcanoes and wild fires, human emissions of carbon into the atmosphere were poised to push the global temperature increase above the critical threshold of 2.5 degrees C above the pre-industrial level. What connects the two problems at the root—the source of the two problems—went unmentioned. In fact, the Pope made a statement that, if acted upon, stood to exacerbate the underlying problem: the exponential explosion of growth of the human population in the twentieth century.
In 1798, Thomas Malthus’ book, An Essay on the Principle of Population, was published. In demonstrating that it is possible for a species’ population to increase beyond the capacity of a species’ food supply, Malthus single-handedly dealt a blow to the “argument from design,” which maintains that the design in Nature implies a designer, and thus the existence of God as an intelligent being. An inherently flawed design found in nature would destroy this “proof” of God’s existence, for an omniscient, perfect being would not create a flawed design. As of the year of the Pope’s visit to Indonesia, the population of the human species, roughly 8.3 billion, had not (yet) outstripped the sprcies's food supply on a global level, but humanity's imprint was clearly already making more than a dent on the planet’s atmosphere and oceans. Malthus predicted not only the possibility of famine and disease from over-population, but also increased conflict, and the two world wars of the twentieth century could have been manifestations of growth pains. After all, Hitler wanted more land to the east for the Germans.
With further increases in population in the twenty first century, not only even more conflict, but also famine and pandemics could occur. As of 2024, climate change was arguably the most dire consequence from the tremendous growth of humanity’s presence on the planet during the prior century. As biological organisms, we cannot help but consume energy. More people means more energy is needed, and other things equal, more pollution is one result. To be sure, pollution abatement technology has helped, but the sheer scale of population has eclipsed such incremental measures to reduce pollution. In terms of “clean” energy, the increase in global energy consumption in 2023 was greater than the increased “clean” energy, so at the end of that year we were more, not less, dependent on fossil fuels. Clearly, technology’s salvific role would be in the long-term rather than right away. In the meantime, humanity could do worse than focus on the source of the environmental problem.
By worse, I have in mind the Pope’s praise of Indonesians “for having large families with up to five children. ‘Keep it up, you’re an example for everyone, for all the countries that maybe, and this might sound funny, (where) these families prefer to have a cat or a little dog instead of a child,’ he said.”[2] Perhaps if more families had one or two children and a dog, the population of our species would be more manageable and more in line with the natural constraints of our planet. Like technology’s role, managing the species’ population in a responsible way is a long-term project. Least of all should we hope for a massive pandemic or war that would decimate the population, as happened in the fourteenth century in Europe during the Black Death (and before then in China). Making sure there are enough workers to support the elderly is but one reason why quick, radical solutions are unwise.
But it is also unwise to preach in favor of larger families. Indeed, such preachments stray from the domain of religion. Put another way, expertise in theology does not include expertise in human ecology. I submit that what makes religion distinct, or sui generis, is precisely its transcendent element, which goes beyond our earthly realm. Pseudo-Dionysius of the 6th century describes religious transcendence as going beyond the limits of human cognition, perception, and sensibility (emotion). Put another way, religious belief, faith, and experience includes a yearning for that which lies beyond. This core of religiosity should have been the Pope’s concern or focus, rather than family planning. He was on firmer ground during his trip in saying that people from different religions are “all brothers, all pilgrims, all on our way to God, beyond what differentiates us.”[3] The latter is what Augustine refers to as earthly matters, whereas being on our way to God intimates transcendence beyond our everyday world. The pope was right to emphasize the transcendence—the shared experience of unifies us all as creatures with an aptitude for transcendence in a distinctly religious sense. To put the matter crassly, if we all push out as many babies as we can, and with medical science exponentially increasing the human lifespan, chances will be greater that there won’t be a habitable planet for people to live in and thus be able to experience transcendence. To borrow a phrase from The Search for Excellence, a business book written in the 1980s, clerics would be wise to “stick to the knitting” rather than try to pontificate on other domains.
1, Joel Guinto, “Pope and
Top Indonesian Imam Make Joint Call for Peace,” BBC.com, September 5, 2024.
2, Ibid.
3, Ibid.
