On Wednesday (Sept. 30), University of Notre Dame President Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., was a guest at The Atlantic’s 2015 Washington Ideas Forum, and spoke with Bloomberg News’ Margaret Carlson and Sen. Edward Markey of Massachusetts about the “Pope Francis Effect.” Father Jenkins, who had been a guest at several papal events in Washington on Sept. 23, said that he was particularly impressed by the warm response of people in Congress to Pope Francis’ speech, which he thought was characterized by “a moral authority that we hear too little of today.” Noting that the pope “simply asks us to live up to our highest standards” and teaches “more by his gestures than by his words,” Father Jenkins praised the recent encyclical Laudato Si’, whose imperatives are reflected in Notre Dame’s recently announced commitment to cease burning coal within five years, and to cut its carbon footprint by more than half by 2030.
Originally published by at news.nd.edu on October 01, 2015.