Laudate Deum is a move in the right direction. But we aren't there yet. Catholic concern for nonhuman animals, in our technocratic times, still has a long way to go.
Commentary: Over the past decade in Christian theological circles, there's been an explosion of concern for nonhuman animals. Leading voices in animal ethics today — religious and secular — reject the idea that nonhuman animals are mere tools.
It should come as no surprise to Pope Francis, the author of the encyclical "Laudato Si'," that at the heart of the COVID-19 pandemic we find a relationship between human beings and the rest of God's creation that has gone terribly wrong.
