By Dennis Sadowski
Catholic organizations welcomed President Barack Obama’s Feb. 24 veto of a bill approving an oil pipeline through the country’s midsection, saying that it allows more opportunity to consider moral questions about the environment and climate change.
Representatives of the groups told Catholic News Service (CNS) they are hopeful that the Keystone XL project would not be approved by the White House after the Department of State concludes its years-long evaluation of the project that would carry oil from the tar sands region of Alberta, Canada, to Gulf Coast refineries.
“He’s doing the right thing by vetoing it. The Keystone pipeline would be very damaging to the environment,” said Patrick Carolan, executive director of the Franciscan Action Network, which has played a major role among faith-based organizations raising concerns about the project.
“As a person of faith, you have to really look at whether it’s just making money for people. You have to look at the whole moral and ethical issue,” Carolan said.
The veto will allow for “more time to reflect on and look at it and hopefully we’ll decide we don’t need this,” he added.
However, supporters of the pipeline criticized the veto.
House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, who is Catholic, labeled the president’s action “a national embarrassment” and promised not to give up on the project.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, promised to seek a vote to override the veto by March 3. It is unsure if he can convince enough Democrats to reverse their vote to achieve the two-thirds majority needed to override.
And TransCanada, the company building the pipeline, said in a statement that it remained “fully committed” to the project despite the veto.
Gerry Lee, executive director of the Maryknoll Office of Global Concerns in Washington, said the president took “the right stand.”
“All along we’ve been opposed to the Keystone XL pipeline largely on concerns on the impact of the indigenous communities (in Canada) and impact on the environment. We just feel it was the right call by the president and we hope he would continue to stand firm on the issue,” he told CNS.
Dan Misleh, executive director of the Catholic Climate Covenant, said the veto calls the country to look more closely at renewable energy sources. “This (veto) is pointing in the direction of the realization that we can’t continue to burn fossil fuels and still keep the planet within reasonable limits to avoid catastrophic climate change. The Obama administration seems to be getting that,” Misleh said.
“Hopefully, the Senate and the House will begin to understand that this is important. This provides an opportunity for dialogue about the issue. More importantly this provides an opportunity to power our economy with cleaner and renewable energy,” he added.
Sadowski is a journalist specializing in reporting on social justice, the environment and poverty.
Why is the Tablet putting out articles such as this? An argument can be made that the pipeline is actually good for the environment since fuel will be transported via pipeline instead of barges, trucks, trains, etc. While renewable energy is a noble goal, the present technology still has a long way to go. The Tablet should be publishing articles concerning our faith and our teaching. For example my youngest son who attends Archbishop Molloy HS recently told me that in a class / group debate it was him and one other student that defended the Catholic position on Traditional (Real) Marriage, while the rest of the group / class has been corrupted with so called “Same Sex Marriage” propaganda. Well our Catholic values are dying!!!!!!