"You offend God not only by stealing, taking the Lord's name in vain or coveting your neighbor's wife, but also by wrecking the environment [and by] carrying out morally debatable experiments that manipulate DNA or harm embryos.''

To paraphrase the Susan B. Anthony quote that appears atop this blog, the interesting thing about God's view of sin is that it always coincides with the personal view of whomever is speaking for him. Bishop Gianfranco Girotti, head of the Apostolic Penitentiary, said the above to the Vatican's official newspaper, l'Osservatore Romano. I might be convinced that creating a large carbon footprint offends God if God had said something about it before it became a cause celebre. Had a bishop said in, say, 1609, that the internal cumbustion engine would create a worldwide environmental catastrophe--that would be impressive. It would demonstrate that God has knowledge beyond what his followers currently know or believe. I'd like God, through the good Bishop Girotti, to make a statement concerning a currently unknown future sin. If Bishop Girotti says, "The use of interflilbegets will harm the ordfarts, and that is sinful," and then 100 years from now those things are either invented or discovered--who could deny that? I wouldn't be inclined to believe in God (I may be alive in 100 years, thanks to science), but it would definitely be an impressive display of prognostication.