ABSTRACT
The main references to population in Laudato Si’ characterized birth control and immigration control as largely excuses for neglecting distributive justice in combating poverty. Growth of the human footprint that displaces other parts of God’s creation is measured by total resource use, which of course is the product of per capita resource use times population. Creation care, limiting the human footprint, requires serious attention to both factors. It is incomplete without consideration of population growth, both by natural increase and by net immigration. Economic and political boundaries are necessary to achieve both national community and a global federation of national communities living in peace and ecological sustainability. Boundaries are also presupposed by the Catholic social doctrine of subsidiarity, advocated in Laudato Si’. In the United States, Western Europe, and Canada, population growth is mainly due to net immigration, and higher average fertility of immigrants.
