Pope John Paul II Quotes

If we each take responsibility in shifting our own behavior, we can trigger the type of change that is necessary to achieve sustainability for our race or this planet. We change our planet, our environment, our humanity every day, every year, every decade, and every millennia.

The earth and its resources belong of right to its people.

The most important question we have to deal with is a combination of population control and the control of our environment - how to utilize the world in as effective a way as we can for the future of mankind.

In time, we will have to recognise that it is not 'nature' that we need to protect, but ourselves, and we can only do this by abandoning the old, grandiose, profit-seeking schemes so beloved of our masters and learning to till the soil, live to scale, and live within our means.

I was taught from a young age that I had to serve, so that turned into me thinking I had to save the planet.

So often we talk about saving the planet, but what we really mean is to save the planet the way it is, so we can live here. So that is can sustain us.

Must we wait for selection to solve the problems of overpopulation, exhaustion of resources, pollution of the environment and a nuclear holocaust, or can we take explicit steps to make our future more secure? In the latter case, must we not transcend selection?

We have to preserve it and use it sustainably. And the short-term use of resources at the destruction of the long-term heritage of this country is not a policy that we can pursue.

But now sustainability is such a political category that it's getting more and more difficult to think about it in a serious way. Sustainability has become an ornament.

What we've proven is that you can protect the environment, use it wisely and grow the economy and that there is no conflict between the two.

Sustainable development is the pathway to the future we want for all. It offers a framework to generate economic growth, achieve social justice, exercise environmental stewardship and strengthen governance.

New Zealand needs to balance its environmental responsibilities with its economic opportunities, because the risk is that if you don't do that - and you want to lead the world - then you might end up getting unintended consequences.

What is needed is the intelligent management of Earth's resources. If we really wish to put an end to our ongoing international and social problems, we must eventually declare Earth and all of its resources as the common heritage of all the world's people.

I believe it is essential for our planetary future to develop tools that can change the consciousness which has created the crisis that we are in.

It's obvious that the key problem facing humanity in the coming century is how to bring a better quality of life - for 8 billion or more people - without wrecking the environment entirely in the attempt.

We're at peak oil, peak water, peak resources, and so either we figure it out and let science lead or we head down a very bad, dark trail to where a lot of people aren't going to make it.

With the observable fact that scientific knowledge makes our lives better when applied with concern for human welfare and environmental protection, there is no question that science and technology can produce abundance so that no one has to go without.

Most times, Mother Earth's resources are used up without the realisation that these thoughtless actions might just be the root cause for the hardships future generations may face. It is everyone's responsibility to hand over a green, clean, and healthy environment to them.

The truth is: the natural world is changing. And we are totally dependent on that world. It provides our food, water and air. It is the most precious thing we have and we need to defend it.

I refuse to condemn your generation and future generations to a planet that's beyond fixing.

We already know enough to begin to cope with all the major problems that are now threatening human life and much of the rest of life on earth. Our crisis is not a crisis of information; it is a crisis of decision of policy and action.

For conservation to be successful it is necessary to take into consideration that it is a characteristic of man that he can only be relied upon to do anything consistently which is in his own interest. He may have occasional fits of conscience and moral rectitude but otherwise his actions are governed by self-interest. It follows then that whatever the moral reasons for conservation it will only be achieved by the inducement of profit or pleasure.

From global warming to fish and wildlife, we've seen that the Bush administration has little regard for scientific findings that don't support its predetermined policies.

Conservation of land and conservation of people frequently go hand in hand

Sustainability is a very tough thing in our government because there are so many different competing priorities.