The Eucharistic Vison of Laudato Si’: Praise, Conversion, and Integral Ecology. By LucasBriola. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2023. Pp. ix, 277. $34.95.

It is pearls that come from the intrusion of a foreign object into the flesh of a clam, correct? Then Briola's work is a pearl of some worth because its careful analysis and insights are copious, even if it is constructed upon a flawed premise. The subject is announced in the title. The problematic premise is that Laudato si’ represents a great advance over the environmental writings of Pope Francis's two immediate predecessors because it sets environmental ecology free from what might be called human ecology. However, the great fruit of this work is an application of Bernard Lonergan's and Robert Doran's theologies of history to an analysis of the encyclical and its desired impact. As used here, ‘human ecology’ refers to issues in philosophical anthropology. What are the imbalances and misunderstandings that mar our perception of ourselves? In contrast, the focus of ‘environmental ecology’ deals with the earth and its natural resources. That set of imbalances and misunderstandings have led to a global crisis that is unprecedented. Briola argues that the great advance of Laudato si’ is to focus upon environmental issues without immediately linking them, as John Paul II and Benedict XVI did, to a Christian critique of modern anthropology. The ecological crisis is clearly acute. Focusing exclusively upon it brings it to a greater, and much needed, prominence in Catholic thought. Previously, in contrast, ‘as concern for the environment progressively became intertwined with John Paul's humanistic program, it risked being eclipsed, if not subsumed, precisely by that program’ (p. 31). The term ‘integral ecology’ of the title is frequently used in the encyclical itself. It is Francis's preferred term for an approach that unites human and environmental concerns. But both of Francis's two immediate predecessors coupled the two. The unassailable advance is that where his predecessors brought up ecological concerns when speaking of anthropological ones, Francis does the opposite. He pens an encyclical on the environment that references anthropology. This work is well researched and, except for an initial chapter that obfuscates more than opens the discussion, it is well-written and very insightful. One example is Briola's analysis of the very terms the last three pontiffs have used to explicate our relationship to the environment. John Paul II employed the age-old and biblical ‘subdue’. Benedict XVI preferred the term ‘cultivate’, which highlights an inherent responsibility that we bear to creation. For him, the duty of cultivation was written into the ‘grammar’ of creation, ‘which sets forth ends and criteria for its wise use, not its reckless exploitation’ (p. 43). Pope Francis represents an advance over both by employing the term ‘care for’, because care is something that we give to that which we love, even passionately. The second, and larger, section of this monograph applies Lonergan's and Doran's work to an analysis, not so much of the encyclical itself but rather to its (possible) impact upon society. As Briola notes, especially in the United States, the impact of the encyclical has been frustrated because of the American cultural divide, which is reflected in its two major political parties. Ecology, the rights of migrants and of workers belong to the left. The right addresses itself to abortion, sexual morality, and freedom of religion. Skilfully employing both Jesuit theologians, Briola shows that change in society, whether positive or negative, oscillates between two far points on a spectrum of values: high values in which a culture expresses its very identity, and lower ones by which it employs its resources. Lower, more immediate values can preclude our perception of those higher, but when a society is healthy, it is the higher values that exercise influence and insight over those that are lower. ‘The scale builds upon Lonergan's invariant structure of the good. On the one hand, vital values reflect the particular good, social values the good of order (a connection Lonergan makes explicitly), and cultural values the good of value. They also form a sublating hierarchy’ (p. 147). For Lonergan and Doran, a culture's oscillating between high and low values illustrates the unique contribution that Christianity makes to modern culture. It calls us to seek higher values that market forces alone cannot identify. Ultimately for Lonergan, it is our perception of God, our experience of being graced, that sets us free from our enslavement to lower values that, if left to themselves, produce our inevitable decline. ‘The effective realization and functioning of lower levels in the scale require transformation at higher levels. The integrity of the scale is recovered insofar as healing moves down the scale, from religious values downward, since a given level cannot resolve its breakdown on its own’ (p. 168). Hence the role and the place of Laudato si’. It calls us to our better selves not as lords of creation but as lovers of it, those who feel compelled to care for the earth because it, and we, are gifts of God. Briola writes, ‘to care is to become painfully aware, to evoke a passion that shatters indifference’ (p. 82). This is top notch theology on Briola's part, but it also illustrates the flaw in his opening thesis. Though he wrote almost nothing about an ecological crisis, which postdated his work, Lonergan's theology of history can indeed be very fruitfully brought to bear, as Briola does so ably, upon the ecological crisis. But the only way to correct the imbalance between higher and lower values is to enunciate them in concert and comparison. Lonergan's prescription for progress relies upon prophets who enunciate and call us to the higher values. Granting this, how can any pontiff call us to greater ecological concern without linking that call to a communion of values that are endangered in modern society? Can a Christian leader avoid discussing what Briola terms ‘human ecology’? The question that Briola so brilliantly brings into focus is this: does this cloud or clarify the communal consensus being sought? Should one expect the leader of the world's Catholics not to talk about human ecology? As Briola notes, like his predecessors, Francis does indeed do just that. Among the topics he addresses in Laudato si’ are: inequality, technology, biodiversity, bioethics, and urban design, as well as abortion. Briola writes: ‘Because the cry of the earth refers to breakdowns on levels lower than that of vital values (and certainly that of personal values), the concerns of human ecology lies higher on the scale than those of natural ecology’ (p. 194). But Francis himself is not more or less integrative of environmental and human concerns that his predecessors. He has simply, in a different time, facing a growing crisis, shifted the emphasis from the human to the environmental. For me, the mark of true theology is that it calls us to contemplation and prayer. In the final analysis, Briola's work does just that, especially in its closing concentration upon the place that worship occupies in Laudato si’. If Lonergan is correct, we are never more ourselves, never more human as God intended us to be, than when we become the voice of creation in praise. In the encyclical Francis himself writes: ‘It is in the Eucharist that all that has been created finds its greatest exaltation’ (§236). Of course, Christian praise is, quite paradoxically, as we make clear in our eucharistic prayers, rooted in the paschal experience of Christ. We give thanks to God that in Christ he has assumed our alienation and carried us, and creation with us, back into the heart of God. Thus, Francis can teach so effectively upon the virtue of tenderness. It arises from ‘the love that comes close and becomes real … Tenderness means to use our eyes to see the other, our ears to hear the other, to listen to the children, the poor, those who are afraid of the future. To listen also to the cry of our common home, our sick and polluted earth’ (Pope Francis, quoted on p. 205). A more philosophical approach might have discussed the unique role of human consciousness in evolution and ecology. We are the only part of creation that is conscious, that must balance competing values to serve the God who created us, what Lonergan himself prefaced in his masterwork Insight, speaking of evolution as the transition from the intelligible to the intelligent. Perhaps this work lies ahead for Briola. In the meantime, he must be credited with highlighting the enduring gift of this first environmental encyclical. It is a vision worthy of the Book of Revelation: a priesthood of believers giving conscious voice to the multifaceted praise that creation is compelled to offer its creator.