Villanova scholars bring Catholic social teaching to Rome sustainability conference

Villanova University faculty members will shed light on the application of Catholic social teaching to nontheological disciplines such as business and engineering at the International Sustainability Conference in Rome. 

Father John Abubakar, chief sustainability officer at Villanova University, told “EWTN News Nightly” on Oct. 12 that the goal of Villanova faculty at the Oct. 12–15 conference, themed “Responding to the Cries of the Earth and the Poor,” is “to bring in the ethical and moral dimension of our responsibility to care for our common home.”

The conference comes after Pope Leo XIV announced that he will admitted to the hospital for surgery on Oct. 13 to remove a “small nodule” found in his lung. The Holy Father had been scheduled to present Cardinal Michael Czerny, prefect emeritus of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, with the conference’s inaugural Pope Leo XIV Sustainability Medal.

“The Pope Leo XIV Sustainability Medal Ceremony will take place on Oct. 13 at the originally announced time and location. We are in close coordination with the Vatican regarding the medal presentation in light of the Holy Fatherʼs upcoming surgery,” Villanova said in a statement. “We are awaiting official confirmation as to whether Pope Leo XIV will present the medal. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Holy Father. May God grant the Holy Father strength, healing and a full recovery in the days ahead.”

Abubakar said the aim of the inaugural award is to fill “an important gap” in the sustainability sphere by emphasizing both “the ethical and moral dimension of caring for our common home and also caring for the poor.”

Measures such as carbon footprints and other environmental benchmarks are important tools for understanding ecological systems, he said, but they alone are not enough.

Villanova professors scheduled to present are David Dinehart, a professor of civil and environmental engineering; Manuela Priesemuth-Payan and Jonathan Doh, professors of business; and Ruth McDermott-Levy, co-director of the Mid-Atlantic Center for Children’s Health and the Environment.

“It is our hope that the research being done will not only emphasize the technical aspects of caring for our common home, but that the moral and the ethical dimension will also be fully embraced,” Abubakar said.

“When you look at Catholic social teaching, the principles are applicable to social settings,” he said. “We speak about the preferential option for the poor, for instance. Such a principle directly applies to those who are engaged in business endeavors. And when you think also about solidarity, when you think about what engineering does in terms of maybe humanitarian engineering, that we have a department at Villanova, they show great sense of solidarity, which is another Catholic social teaching principle.”