Young Catholic at center of lawsuit challenging Trump's climate science rejection

EarthBeat Weekly
Your weekly newsletter about faith and climate change

March 6, 2026

The ExxonMobil Baton Rouge Refinery in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, May 15, 2021. (OSV News/Reuters/Kathleen Flynn)

Today at EarthBeat, I reported on one of the lawsuits filed in recent weeks challenging the Trump administration's reversal of the endangerment finding, the 2009 scientific determination by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency that concluded greenhouse gases that are driving climate change pose a danger to public health and welfare.

The endangerment finding has served as the legal foundation for EPA's climate regulations, including limits on emissions from vehicles as well as power plants and other polluting industrial sources.

The loss of such regulations is worrisome to Elena Venner, a 21-year-old Catholic and engineering student at California Polytechnic State University. Worrisome enough that she joined a lawsuit challenging the legality of EPA's repeal of the endangerment finding.

The suit, Venner v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, is unique in that it alleges that ending the endangerment finding is a violation of the constitutional rights of Venner and her 17 fellow youth plaintiffs to life and liberty as well as religious freedom.

"For me Catholicism is maintaining the dignity of all human life," she told me in an interview. "[In] Laudato Si', Pope Francis explains that protecting the environment and protecting human life, they're inseparable and we'll all interconnected.

"And so with the endangerment finding [repeal] and just with climate change in general, our environment is being degraded," Venner said. "The conditions for basic life are dependent on maintaining a stable climate and access to clean air and water, and so when that isn't protected life isn't being protected."

This was actually the second time I had interviewed a member of the Venner family. Back in the summer of 2019, I met with her older brother, Nick, on a hiking trail outside Denver to talk about the legal case he had joined as a child suing the federal government over its inaction on climate change. [In fact, my profile on Nick Venner was the debut story when EarthBeat launched in October 2019.]

Both climate cases that the Venners joined were coordinated by Our Children's Trust, a nonprofit public interest law firm that has represented youth clients in a series of federal and state lawsuits seeking legally binding policies to address climate change.

Young people go through an application process in order to join a case. Julia Olson, chief legal counsel for Our Children's Trust, said that Elena Venner's story of her religious background and how climate change has harmed her — poor air quality exacerbating asthma, family and friends evacuating their homes from wildfires, concern with a rapidly heating planet leading her to pause thinking about having children — made her an ideal fit for the endangerment finding lawsuit.

In determining whose name gets attached to the case, Olson said they lean toward an older plaintiff, and "we always try to find someone to do that who's willing and able to take that on comfortably enough [in the public spotlight]. And Elena was graciously willing to step into that role."

"I care a lot about climate change," Venner told me, "so I just wanted to be a part of helping where I can."

What else is new on EarthBeat:

Climate change, crowds prompt maintenance on Michelangelo's 'Last Judgment'

by Justin McLellan

Visitors often reach the Sistine Chapel overheated after walking through non-air-conditioned galleries. Combined with rising temperatures those conditions have led to more sweat in the sacred space.

Read more here »

Vietnamese sisters grow organic mushrooms to serve community and fund scholarships

by Joachim Pham

They use no chemical fertilizers or pesticides. Waste is reused. Damaged mushrooms are dried and ground into seasoning powder.

Read more here »

Vatican theological commission warns of replacing God with 'a world governed by machines'

by Courtney Mares, OSV News

The Vatican's International Theological Commission has warned that if humanity places total trust in technology in a "world ruled by machines," it risks replacing the "living God" with a counterfeit "virtual God."

Read more here »

In these hopeless times, hope is a gift and a choice

by Daniel P. Horan

"Christian hope is nothing like optimism or the unfounded conviction that 'everything will work out fine,' " writes Daniel P. Horan.

Read more here »

What's happening in other climate news:

The sea is higher than we thought and millions more are at risk, study finds —Seth Borenstein and Annika Hammerschlag for the Associated Press

Oil, gasoline prices jump amid Iran strikes, with future uncertain —Rachel Frazin for The Hill

Chart: US to overwhelmingly build clean power in 2026 —Julian Spector for Canary Media

Trump's high-profile oil and gas lease sale in Alaska has no takers —Lisa Friedman for The New York Times

After a lawsuit, USDA agrees to share climate risk data with farmers —Frida Garza for Grist

Why electricity bills are so high — and how the blowback could hit Trump —Dan Gearino and Marianne Lavelle for Inside Climate News

Dow asks Texas to legalize plastic pollution from its Seadrift complex —Dylan Baddour for Inside Climate News

An Army Corps project could wipe out one of Florida's last thriving coral reefs —Nicolás Rivero for the Washington Post

With only 3 women left, an Amazon tribe faced extinction. An unexpected birth now brings hope —Gabriela Sá Pessoa for the Associated Press

Marsupials previously thought extinct for millennia discovered in New Guinea —Adam Morton for the Guardian

Final Beat:

Over the years, EarthBeat has reported several times on the stunning work of artist Angela Manno, who paints endangered animal and plant species in the style of sacred Byzantine iconography.

That coverage has included several reviews and reflections on exhibits of the New York artist's captivating and thought-provoking images, which Manno said she's created to help foster an "ecological conversion" that's been championed by both Pope Leo XIV and Pope Francis. A 2019 United Nations report estimated 1 million species are believed to be in danger of extinction, mainly because of human activity such as climate change and deforestation.

For those who haven't had the chance to see Manno's artwork in person, a new book offers a new opening to engage the animal icons at home, The Sacred Biodiversity Oracle. The boxed set includes 36 full-color reproductions of her sacred icons of threatened and endangered species along with a guidebook that includes references to integral ecology from Francis' encyclical "Laudato Si', on Care of Our Common Home" and theologians Leonardo Boff and Thomas Berry, among others.

"The cards and guidebook are an extension of my art that allows more people to have access to it and to have a truly in-depth experience with the images and the creatures they represent, to foster awareness, compassion and action," Manno said in an email.

Starting next week, Manno's Sacred Biodiversity art series will be on display at the Moray Art Centre in Findhorn, Scotland. The series runs March 14-April 25, and will include several events, including an online discussion April 15 with Catholic theologian Elizabeth Johnson among the panelists.

As always, thanks for reading EarthBeat.

Brian Roewe
Environment Correspondent
National Catholic Reporter
broewe@ncronline.org