Though neither the Vatican nor the U.S. bishops have made a statement on nuclear power, the church has outlined the ethical case for renewable energy. In Centesimus Annus [3] Pope John Paul II wrote that just as Pope Leo XIII in 1891 had to confront “primitive capitalism” in order to defend workers’ rights, he himself had to confront the “new capitalism” in order to defend collective goods like the environment. Pope Benedict XVI warned that pollutants “make the lives of the poor especially unbearable.” In their 2001 statement Global Climate Change [4], the U.S. Catholic bishops repeated his point: climate change will “disproportionately affect the poor, the vulnerable, and generations yet unborn.”

The bishops also warn that “misguided responses to climate change will likely place even greater burdens on already desperately poor peoples.” Instead they urge “energy conservation and the development of alternate renewable and clean-energy resources.” They argue that renewable energy promotes care for creation and the common good, lessens pollution that disproportionately harms the poor and vulnerable, avoids threats to future generations and reduces nuclear-proliferation risks.