As our nation crafts a policy to reduce carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions responsible for global climate change, there is growing opposition to enactment of legislation on the basis of cost - it will cost too much to address the problem, therefore, we should not act.

However, responding to climate change is fundamentally a matter of conscience and morality, not just financial cost, especially when the well-being of hundreds of millions of human beings, their way of life, livelihoods and communities are at stake.

In a different historical context, defenders of slavery made a similar argument - that the success of the sugar industry was dependent on the use of slaves and that abolition would destroy the economy. The financial arguments of slave owners and traders looks preposterous today, just as our current obsession with the costs of confronting climate change will look unforgivably short-sighted to future generations.

Cost has eclipsed consideration of the larger consequences of failure to limit CO2 emissions for those who are most vulnerable, including those living in densely populated and impoverished regions of the world, low-lying island nations and coastal communities, and even regions of the U.S. and other wealthy countries that are predicted to experience prolonged drought and/or extreme weather events. The impacts of climate change are also projected to exacerbate scarcity of water and/or food, giving rise to environmental refugees.

The planet will continue on regardless of climate change, but a significant portion of humanity will be forced to endure adverse conditions and a blighted future. As we determine our response to climate change, we must ask ourselves: Have we been in service of a higher good, both to humanity and creation? Have we loved our neighbors as ourselves? Have our actions alleviated, rather than contributed to, the suffering of others?

(The Rev. Paul Schuster is a priest at St. Mark's Catholic Church, Bottineau, and St. Andrew's Catholic Church, Westhope.)