Ali Santore points with pride to the fact that more than 100 of Providence St. Joseph Health's facilities — including its headquarters in Renton, Washington, and many others across Washington, Oregon and Texas — operate on 100% renewable energy.
Santore, Providence's chief communication and external affairs officer, says the health care system's continuing move away from energy generated by fossil fuels — known to create pollution and deplete natural resources — is part of a comprehensive effort rooted in Catholic social teaching to protect the environment and address climate change.
Providence is unwavering in its sustainability push, she says, even as the Trump administration begins to roll back environmental protections.
"This continues to be a major commitment and area of focus for us, especially coming up on the 10-year anniversary of Pope Francis' encyclical Laudato Si'," Santore says. "We aren't backing down on our commitment to pursue environmental stewardship and improve the health of our planet because it's grounded in Catholic social teaching."
Many other Catholic institutions and organizations have made similar pledges to pursue sustainability. They point to Catholic teachings and Laudato Si' in particular as guideposts. Laudato Si' is a call to action issued by the pope in 2015. It urges Catholics to care for the planet and all its inhabitants, especially the most vulnerable and marginalized.
Policies of concern
Kayla Jacobs is a program manager at Catholic Climate Covenant, a nonprofit that works to inspire and educate Catholics to act on Laudato Si'. CHA and many other Catholic organizations are partners in the covenant's efforts.
Jacobs notes that caring for the planet is one of the seven guiding principles of Catholic social teaching.
Catholic Climate Covenant, she says, opposes policies being advanced by the Trump administration that the organization sees as undermining environmental protections. The policies of high concern include:
- Withdrawing from the Paris Agreement, a pact in which the United States joined other nations in efforts to mitigate climate change but that the administration says is among international agreements that "do not reflect our country's values or our contributions to the pursuit of economic and environmental objectives"
- Declaring a national energy emergency, a move the administration says will improve "economic and national security," but that Catholic Climate Covenant warns could lead to environmental degradation by expanding the use of fossil fuels rather than encouraging the transition to renewable energy sources
- Rescinding environmental justice initiatives, which President Donald Trump called "environmental extremism," but the covenant says addresses the disproportionate impact of environmental harm on marginalized communities, including people of color and low-income populations
"We have been working so hard for longer than the last decade, longer than before Laudato Si' came out, to get policy in the United States that better represents Catholic social teaching in all regards," Jacobs says. "We're deeply disturbed by how the administration has rolled back any progress and that it has also implemented policies that will make things worse for the climate."
Taking the lead
Indu Spugnardi, CHA's senior director of community health and eldercare, says Catholic health care providers have shown strong support for protecting creation "by taking leadership in making environmental sustainability a strategic and mission priority."
"They're not just looking at carbon reduction, but they're looking at all the ways their operations contribute to pollution or waste," she says. "They're looking at ways to reduce their impact on the environment. They're also looking at protecting operating capacity, community health and community resilience as the impacts of global warming become more intense and widespread. It's a very comprehensive, holistic approach."
Spugnardi sees health care playing an important role in raising awareness of the health impacts of global warming and pollution so policymakers, media and the public know the consequences of rolling back environmental protections.
She notes that changes planned by the administration haven't been made yet. "I think this is an opportunity for the health care field, the faith community, to say, 'Hey, look, please remember that these rules were put into place because there was so much scientific evidence that (environmental degradation) hurts people's health,'" says.
New term, same playbook
Dr. Philip J. Landrigan, a biology professor at Boston College and director of the Catholic university's Program for Global Public Health and the Common Good and its Global Observatory on Planetary Health, has a less optimistic view of prospects for changing the direction of the current administration. He says in Trump's first term, the administration tried to roll back 104 environmental regulations and succeeded in curtailing 84. The Biden administration had reversed many of those policies.
"This is basically a reprise of what we saw during the first Trump administration, with a big difference being that it's moving much more rapidly, much earlier in the administration," Landrigan says. "It's much more organized."
After the first Trump administration ended, Landrigan was among several researchers who co-authored a report published in February 2021 in The Lancet medical journal on the impact of the administration's policies. One finding was that the pullback of environmental regulations caused more than 22,000 unnecessary deaths in 2019 alone. Those deaths were from health conditions brought on or worsened by environmental factors and of workers who succumbed to occupational diseases, such as coal miners who died of black lung.
Landrigan says several items on Trump's latest environmental agenda worry him. One is the plan to weaken rules on mercury and air toxics, which could mean more harmful emissions from coal-fired factories. He notes that coal releases particulate pollution and mercury as it burns.
Particulate pollution creates health risks that include higher chances for heart disease, lung disease and stroke, Landrigan says. Meanwhile, he notes that as mercury makes its way from the atmosphere to the food chain, it poses especially significant risks for fetuses, such as brain damage.
"I find very ironic that an administration that claims to be pro-life is actually causing change in the environment that will damage life at every stage, from the unborn child in the womb to the elderly who are at highest risk of heart diseases," Landrigan says.
He sees the Catholic Church and its institutions as being poised to push back on the administration's deregulation plans. He notes that in announcing the administration's agenda in March, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lee Zeldin portrayed the policies as freeing American industry from unnecessary shackles.
"He said not a word about the impacts of these rollbacks on human health," Landrigan says. "And I think the Catholic Church is in a splendid position to present the opposite narrative, and that is to say that rolling back these protections exposes all Americans — and especially the poorest, the most vulnerable among us — to environmental hazards that are going to cause disease and death."
Payoffs
Santore says Providence's environmental strategy has paid off not only by reducing the system's impact on the planet but also by improving its bottom line. "As of 2023, we are tracking a savings of $40 million annually from environmental stewardship efforts," she notes.
She says the system expects to see big payoffs for the communities it serves, too, as it incorporates environmental considerations into its community health needs assessments. The system is identifying "communities of concern" that could be most vulnerable to significant climate events, such as wildfires and drought. Once those populations are identified, Providence is focusing on ways to build up their resilience and create emergency plans for them, such as making sure there are adequate emergency room beds and supplies to treat heatstroke, respiratory illnesses and other conditions related to the environment.
"I think that we in Catholic health care should view our current external environment as a call to action," Santore says. "Pope Francis laid out his call to action 10 years ago, and it's our responsibility to carry that action forward."