VATICAN INFORMATION SERVICE   
   YEAR XXII - # 179   
   DATE 14-10-2015   
      
   Summary:   
   - General audience: keep our promises to children   
   - The struggle against poverty   
   - The Pope praises local development   
   - The Circuli Minori discuss the second part of the Instrumentum Laboris: the   
   importance of divine pedagogy   
   - Other Pontifical Acts   
      
   ___________________________________________________________   
      
    General audience: keep our promises to children   
    Vatican City, 14 October 2015 (VIS) - Before beginning this Wednesday's   
   general   
   audience, the Holy Father asked for forgiveness for the various scandals that   
   have occurred in Rome and in the Vatican during recent days.   
    Returning to the theme of aspects of the relationship between the Church and   
   the family, the Pope dedicated today's catechesis to to promises we make to   
   children. He explained that this did not mean the many promises we make during   
   the day to make them happy or good, or to encourage them to work hard at   
   school,   
   but rather the most important ones, "decisive for their expectations in life,   
   for their trust in relation to other human beings, for their capacity to   
   conceive of God's name as a blessing".   
    "We adults refer to children as a promise of life", he continued. "And we are   
   easily moved by this, saying that the young are our future. But I wonder, at   
   times, if we are equally serios about their future! A question that we should   
   ask more often is this: how faithful are we to the promises we make to children   
   when we bring them into our world? Welcome and care, closeness and attention,   
   trust and hope, are all basic promises, that may be summarised in one word:   
   love. This is the best way to welcome a human being into the world, and we all   
   learn this before being aware of it. It is a promise that a man and a woman   
   make   
   to every child, from the moment he or she is conceived in their thoughts".   
    When instead this promise is not honoured, "children are wounded by an   
   unbearable 'scandal', made even more serious by the fact that they are unable   
   to   
   understand it. God keeps watch over this promise from the very first moment. Do   
   you remember what Jesus said? 'Their angels in heaven always see the face of my   
   Father in heaven'. Woe to those who betray their trust, woe! Their trustful   
   abandonment to our promise, that commits us from the very first moment, will be   
   our judgement". The Pope added that children's spontaneous trust in God "should   
   never be harmed, especially when this occurs as a result of a certain   
   presumption, more or less consciously, to substitute Him. God's tender and   
   mysterious relationship with the soul of children must never be violated. A   
   child is ready from birth to feel loved by God. As soon as he or she is able to   
   feel loved, a child also feels that there is a God Who loves children".   
    "Only if we look at children with God's eyes are we truly able to understand   
   how, by defending the family, we protect humanity! The viewpoint of children is   
   the viewpoint of the Son of God". Francis recalled that the Church herself, in   
   Baptism, makes great promises to children, that require commitment on the part   
   of parents and the Christian community, and concluded by asking that Our Lady   
   and St. Joseph teach us to welcome Jesus in every child God sends us.   
      
   ___________________________________________________________   
      
    The struggle against poverty   
    Vatican City, 14 October 2015 (VIS) - Following today's catechesis, the Holy   
   Father mentioned that Saturday 17 October will be International Day for the   
   Eradication of Poverty, instituted by Fr. Joseph Wresinski, France. The aim of   
   this day is to promote greater efforts for the elimination of extreme poverty   
   and discrimination, to ensure that every person is able to fully exercise his   
   or   
   her fundamental rights. "We are all invited to make this intention our own, so   
   that Christ's charity may reach and relieve the poorest and most abandoned of   
   our brothers and sisters", said Pope Francis.   
      
   ___________________________________________________________   
      
    The Pope praises local development   
    Vatican City, 14 October 2015 (VIS) - The Holy Father has written a letter to   
   Piero Fassino, mayor of Turin, Italy, to the authorities and to all   
   participants   
   in the Third Global Forum on Local Development, held in Turin from 13 to 16   
   October. The Pope wished to contribute to this forum by recalling some of the   
   ideas he expressed recently before the Assembly of the United Nations,   
   regarding   
   the Sustainable Development Goals, which are "a hope for humanity, provided   
   they   
   are implemented in the correct way".   
    In the text, the Pope stresses the importance of the decisions adopted by the   
   international community that, however, "runs the risk of falling into the trap   
   of a declamatory nominalism, creating a tranquillising effect on consciences".   
   He also remarks that the multiplicity and complexity of problems require the   
   use   
   of technical tools of measurement. "This, however, leads to a twofold danger:   
   becoming limited to the bureaucratic exercise of drawing up a long list of good   
   intentions, or creating a single a priori theoretical solution to respond to   
   all   
   challenges".   
    "Political and economic action are a prudential activity, guided by the   
   perennial concept of justice, and it must always be taken into consideration   
   that before any plan or programme, there are real men and women, equal to their   
   governors, who live, struggle and suffer, who must be the masters of their own   
   destiny. Integral human development and the full exercise of human dignity   
   cannot be imposed".   
    From this perspective, he adds, "local economic development seems to be the   
   most suitable response to the challenges presented to us by a globalised   
   economy, the results of which are often cruel". Francis mentions his address to   
   the United Nations, in which he spoke about how "the simplest measure and   
   indicator of the fulfilment of the new Agenda for development would be   
   effective, practical and immediate access to indispensable material and   
   spiritual goods. ... The only way of truly reaching these goals in a permanent   
   way   
   is by working at a local level". He remarks that the recurrent world crises   
   have   
   demonstrated how economic decisions that in general seek to promote the   
   progress   
   of all through the generation of new consumption and the continuing increase of   
   profits are unsustainable for the progress of the global economy itself". These   
   decisions are also, he adds, "immoral, as they sideline any question about what   
   is just and what truly serves the common good".   
    He concludes by praising Christian social thinking in Italy, through important   
   figures such as Giuseppe Toniolo, Don Sturzo and others who, in the wake of   
   Pope   
   Leo XIII's Encyclical "Rerum novarum", were able to offer an economic analysis   
   that, starting from the local and territorial context, proposes options and   
   directions for the world economy, and notes that much secular social thought,   
   while based on different premises, makes similar proposals.   
      
   ___________________________________________________________   
      
    The Circuli Minori discuss the second part of the Instrumentum Laboris: the   
   importance of divine pedagogy   
    Vatican City, 14 October 2015 (VIS) - During this morning's General   
   Congregation the various working groups presented to the Synod Fathers the   
   result of their reflections on the second part of the Instrumentum Laboris.   
    Almost all the groups agreed on the need for the final document of the Synod   
   to   
   use the language of biblical theology and, as affirmed by the French group B,   
   to   
   be clear and simple, avoiding ambiguity and misunderstandings that may impair   
   understanding of the mission and the vocation of the family in the Church and   
   in   
   the world. It will be necessary to take into account the fragility and the   
   suffering of the family, without overstating the current situation, as these   
   problems have always existed. The emphasis on this dimension leads the group to   
   stress that the Church accompanies all her children, and must proclaim the   
   Gospel and its call to conversion.   
    The English group B comments that the final document should illustrate how   
   divine pedagogy for marriage and the family has accompanied the entire history   
   of salvation and continues right until our day. "We propose ... [beginning]   
   with   
   Genesis, which already provide a definition of marriage as a unique union   
   between a man and a woman, so total and intimate that because of it a man must   
   leave his father and mother in order to be united with his wife. This account   
   of   
   the creation of marriage presents also the three basic characteristics of   
   marriage, as it was in the beginning - monogamy, permanence, and equality of   
   the   
   sexes. ... But the divine pedagogy of salvation history concerning marriage and   
   the family reached its climax with the Son of God's entry in human history".   
   The   
   group acknowledges that "It is only through reflection on the divine pedagogy   
   that we will understand our ministry as mirroring God's patience and mercy. The   
   divine plan continues even in our time. It is the divine pedagogy which   
   provides   
   content and tone for the teaching of the Church". With regard to the difficult   
   situations to be examined in the third part, the group emphasises that "we   
   should always remember that God never gives up on his mercy. It is mercy which   
   reveals God's true face. God's mercy reaches out to all of us, especially to   
   those who suffer, those who are weak, and those who fail".   
    The French group, whose rapporteur is Archbishop Laurent Ulrich of Lille,   
   France, also speaks about divine pedagogy, and proposes "emphasising the many   
   encounters between Jesus and families" throughout the Gospels, reaffirming that   
   "divine pedagogy acts in all biblical revelation and must continue to be   
   experienced by the Church, following families in their joys and sorrows".   
   Another observation of this group, that resonates widely, is that the Relatio   
   should express a broader conceptual unity and not speak about indissolubility   
   as   
      
   --- MPost/386 v1.21   
    * Origin: Sursum Corda! BBS=Huntsville AL=bbs.sursum-corda.com (1:396/45)