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                                  VIS-Press releases   
      
   SHARED VALUES AND RIGHTS FOR DIALOGUE AMONG CULTURES   
      
   VATICAN CITY, 8 SEP 2010 (VIS) - Following his general audience this morning,   
   the Holy Father received members of the Bureau of the Parliamentary Assembly of   
   the Council of Europe. The meeting marked the sixtieth anniversary of the   
   European Convention on Human Rights, which "commits member States of the   
   Council of Europe to promote and defend the inviolable dignity of the human   
   person".   
      
   Speaking English, Benedict XVI referred to the topics on the parliamentary   
   assembly's agenda, such as "persons who live in particularly difficult   
   situations or are subjected to grave violations of their dignity". He made   
   particular mention of "people afflicted with handicaps, children who suffer   
   violence, immigrants, refugees, those who pay the most for the present economic   
   and financial crisis, those who are victims of extremism or of new forms of   
   slavery such as human trafficking, the illegal drug trade and prostitution, ...   
   victims of warfare and people who live in fragile democracies". The Pope also   
   dwelt on the organisation's efforts "to defend religious freedom and to oppose   
   violence and intolerance against believers in Europe and worldwide.   
      
   "Keeping in mind the context of today's society in which different peoples and   
   cultures come together", he added, "it is imperative to develop the universal   
   validity of these rights as well as their inviolability, inalienability and   
   indivisibility. On different occasions I have pointed out the risks associated   
   with relativism in the area of values, rights and duties. If these were to lack   
   an objective rational foundation, common to all peoples, and were based   
   exclusively on particular cultures, legislative decisions or court judgements,   
   how could they offer a solid and long-lasting ground for supranational   
   institutions such as the Council of Europe? ... How could a fruitful dialogue   
   among cultures take place without common values, rights and stable, universal   
   principles understood in the same way by all member States of the Council of   
   Europe?"   
      
   He went on: "These values, rights and duties are rooted in the natural dignity   
   of each person, something which is accessible to human reasoning. The Christian   
   faith does not impede, but favours this search, and is an invitation to seek a   
   supernatural basis for this dignity".   
      
   The Holy Father concluded by expressing his conviction that "these principles,   
   faithfully maintained, above all when dealing with human life, from conception   
   to natural death, with marriage - rooted in the exclusive and indissoluble gift   
   of self between one man and one woman - and freedom of religion and education,   
   are necessary conditions if we are to respond adequately to the decisive and   
   urgent challenges that history presents".   
   AC/VIS 20100908 (440)   
      
   SUMMARY   
      
   --- MPost/386 v1.21   
    * Origin: Sursum Corda! BBS =Meridian, MS= bbs.sursum-corda.com (1:396/45)