True Environmentalists Are Pro-Life, Says Pope

Affirms Ecology Issue Should Be Set in Larger Framework

VATICAN CITY, JAN. 11, 2010 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI says efforts to protect the environment cannot be opposed to human life and safeguarding the dignity of the person.

The Pope took up this theme today when he delivered his traditional New Year address to the diplomatic corps accredited to the Holy See.

The Holy Father's address for 2010 centered on the issue of respect for creation and the environment, the same theme he highlighted in his Jan. 1 World Day of Peace message.

He noted not humanity in this new year "continues to be marked by the dramatic crisis of the global economy and consequently a serious and widespread social instability."

The "deeper causes" of this situation, the Pontiff contended, "are to be found in a current self-centered and materialistic way of thinking which fails to acknowledge the limitations inherent in every creature."

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