Pope Benedict turns saving souls to saving environment: Knowledge Driven Revolution

Like the most gleeful Greenpeacer sans ponytail, Pope Benedict XVI has joined the cause of the tragically hip in secular Europe.

In his main homily to 300,000 young Roman Catholics at a weekend gathering run-up to the 2008 Catholic World Youth Day in Sydney, Australia which he plans to attend, the pontiff called for "courageous decisions" to safeguard creation.

In a little more than two years after throngs of young people cried out, "John Paul II we love you", the mission for World Youth Day has changed direction from saving souls to saving the environment.

"Wearing green vestments, the pontiff told the crowd it was up to them to save the planet from development which often upset "nature's delicate equilibrium". (BBC News, Sept. 2, 2007).

Pope Benedict XVI, Pope John Paul II That God is the creator of the universe is no longer a guaranteed message from the Sunday morning pulpit.

And the sky is no safer from falling over the Vatican than it is anywhere else.

"Before it's too late, we need to make courageous choices that will create a strong alliance between man and Earth," he said.

"We need a decisive `yes' to care for creation and a strong commitment to reverse those trends that risk making the situation of decay irreversible."

Better put than Al Gore himself could have put it.

While throngs of young people tippled back on bottled water, Pope Benedict focused on water, which he described as a "precious" resource and a potential source of tension and conflict.

Rather than scapulars and medals, the emphasis of the Saturday festival, at the shrine of Loreto in Italy, was on the environment. Each participant went home with a free knapsack made out of recycled plastic.

Very much like the goodie bag of election-bound politicians, the pontiff's gift package contained a hand-cranked battery charger, plates and cutlery made from bio-degradable plastic and bags for tying up their rubbish when they left.

To prove that his carbon footprint could rival the feet of an infant, the Pope is installing solar panels on the roof of the main audience hall at the Vatican, and is paying for a forestry project to offset the Vatican's carbon emissions.

If history's first tree-hugging pontiff made any reference to the persecution of Christians worldwide, the mainstream media made not mention of it.

Meanwhile, it's an Inconvenient Truth for some that the Environment has become the new religion.