thinking and a new cultural synthesis so as to overcome purely technical
approaches and to harmonise the various political currents with a view to the
common good. The latter, seen as an ensemble of positive interpersonal and
institutional relationships
at the service of the integral growth of individuals and groups, is at the
basis of all true education for peace.
A pedagogy for peacemakers
"7. In the end, we see clearly the need to propose and promote a pedagogy of
peace. This calls for a rich interior life, clear and valid moral points of
reference, and appropriate attitudes and lifestyles. Acts of peacemaking
converge for the
achievement of the common good; they create interest in peace and cultivate
peace. Thoughts, words and gestures of
Subject: VISnews121214
From: Vatican Information Service - Eng - txt
peace create a mentality and a culture of peace, and a respectful, honest and
cordial atmosphere. There is a need, then, to teach people
to love one another, to cultivate peace and to live with good will rather than
mere tolerance. A fundamental encouragement to this is 'to say no to revenge,
to recognize injustices, to accept apologies without looking for them, and
finally, to forgive',
in such a way that mistakes and offences can be acknowledged in truth, so as
to move forward together towards reconciliation. This requires the growth of a
pedagogy of pardon. Evil is in fact overcome by good, and justice is to be
sought in
imitating God the Father Who loves all His children. This is a slow process,
for it presupposes a spiritual evolution, an education in lofty values, a new
vision of human history. There is a need to renounce that false peace promised
by the idols of
this world along with the dangers which accompany it, that false peace which
dulls consciences, which leads to self-absorption, to a withered existence
lived in indifference. The pedagogy of peace, on the other hand, implies
activity, compassion,
solidarity, courage and perseverance.
"Jesus embodied all these attitudes in His own life, even to the complete gift
of Himself, even to 'losing His life'. He promises His disciples that sooner
or later they will make the extraordinary discovery to which I originally
alluded, namely that
God is in the world, the God of Jesus, fully on the side of man. Here I would
recall the prayer asking God to make us instruments of His peace, to be able
to bring His love wherever there is hatred, His mercy wherever there is hurt,
and true faith
wherever there is doubt. For our part, let us join Blessed John XXIII in
asking God to enlighten all leaders so that, besides caring for the proper
material welfare of their peoples, they may secure for them the precious gift
of peace, break down the
walls which divide them, strengthen the bonds of mutual love, grow in
understanding, and pardon those who have done them wrong; in this way, by His
power and inspiration all the peoples of the earth will experience fraternity,
and the peace
for
which they long will ever flourish and reign among them.
"With this prayer I express my hope that all will be true peacemakers, so that
the city of man may grow in fraternal harmony, prosperity and peace."
___________________________________________________________
CHRISTMAS TREE: A SIGN AND REMINDER OF DIVINE LIGHT
Vatican City, 14 December 2012 (VIS) - This morning Benedict XVI received in
audience a delegation from the Italian region of Molise, which this year has
donated the fir tree raised next to the Nativity scene in St. Peter's Square.
The lighting ceremony
will take place later on today.
The Pope thanked the delegation for the silver fir - which was accompanied by
eight other smaller trees destined for the Apostolic Palace and various other
locations around the Vatican - and greeted them following a brief address.
"God became man and came among us to dispel the shadows of sin, bringing His
divine light to humanity. This highest of lights, symbolised and recalled by
the Christmas tree, has not only shown no sign of dimming through the passing
of the centuries and
the millennia, but rather continues to shine upon us and to illuminate every
person who comes into the world, especially in moments of uncertainty and
difficulty. Jesus Himself declared, 'I am the light of the world. Whoever
follows me will never walk
in darkness but will have the light of life'. ... And, the attempts made
through the ages to extinguish the light of God, to replace it with the glare
of illusion and deceit, have heralded episodes of tragic violence against
mankind. This is because the
attempt to cancel the name of God from the pages of history results in
distortion, in which even the most beautiful and noble words lose their true
meaning".
___________________________________________________________
AUDIENCES
Vatican City, 14 December 2012 (VIS) - The Holy Father today received in
audience Cardinal Marc Ouellet P.S.S., prefect of the Congregation for Bishops.
___________________________________________________________
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VISnews121214
VATICAN INFORMATION SERVICE YEAR XXII - N° 228DATE 14-12-2012
Summary: - PRESENTATION OF THE POPE'S
MESSAGE FOR WORLD DAY OF PEACE - BLESSED ARE THE PEACEMAKERS - CHRISTMAS TREE: A SIGN AND REMINDER
OF DIVINE LIGHT - AUDIENCES
PRESENTATION OF THE POPE'S MESSAGE FOR WORLD DAY OF PEACE
Vatican City, 14 December 2012 (VIS) - A press conference was held this
morning in the Holy See Press Office to present Benedict XVI's Message for the
46th World Day of Peace, which will take place on 1 January with the theme
"Blessed are the
peacemakers". Participating in today's conference were Cardinal Peter Kodwo
Appiah Turkson and Bishop Mario Toso S.D.B., respectively president and
secretary of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace.
The cardinal referred first to the "concrete" nature of the document. "The
title, drawn from the Gospel, would induce us to think of the Message as
having a rather spiritual or, so to speak, theoretical nature", he said.
"However, the Pope's message
is very closely linked to reality. It states a fact - the existence, in the
midst of conflicts, tension and violence, of numerous peacemakers; in the
explanation of the Gospel beatitude it explains that this is a promise that is
guaranteed, in that it
is made by God and does not refer merely to the future but already finds
fulfilment in this life. It clearly indicates the duties of peacemakers: they
must promote life in its fullest expression, in its entirety and therefore in
all the dimensions of
the human person, and draws attention to urgent problems issues such as the
correct vision of marriage, the right to conscientious objection, religious
freedom, the issues of work and unemployment, the
food crisis, the financial crisis, and the role of the family in education.
He then went on to emphasise the "positivity" of the Message which, "aside
from opening the way to hope, reflects love for life and life in its
completeness. Alongside the theme of the defence of life, the Pope highlights
matters connected to
justice, necessary for a worthwhile life, lived fully, or rather in which all
people have the opportunity to develop their own potential".
A further characteristic of the text is its "educational and pedagogical
perspective. ...This is an aspect which is always close to the heart of the
Church, one of whose tasks is to 'form consciences'", the cardinal emphasised.
"In this regard, the
Pontiff calls for responsibility on the part of the various educational
institutions who must form capable leaders and propose new economic and
financial models. This is necessary to overcome the particularly grave
situation the globalised world is
currently facing, a phase of profound spiritual and moral crisis in which
there are still bloody conflicts and numerous threats to peace".
Bishop Mario Toso observed that Benedict XVI's message is "an invitation to
become peacemakers 'at three hundred and sixty degrees', in our entirety,
protecting and implementing all the rights and duties of the individual and of
communities".
He continued, "Typical of the Pontiff's view is the part of the Message in
which he urges us not to erode social rights, foremost among which he includes
the right to work, which is a fundamental rather than marginal right. This is
in spite of the
context of economic recession, provoked in part by the financial crisis which
began in 2007, and ideologies of radical liberalism and technocracy according
to which development can be achieved without social and democratic progress.
Without the defence
and promotion of social rights - as recognised by liberals, communists,
socialists and Catholics during the last century - civil and political rights
cannot be adequately attained, and democracy itself - substantial, social and
participatory - would be
undermined.
"In summary, the Message promotes the growth of a human family that is not
divided into groups and peoples in favour of life, and those who work for
peace without equal passion for the defence of human life from conception to
natural end. Peace is a
common goal to be pursued as a community, to the full benefit of every human
being and population", concluded the secretary of the Pontifical Council for
Justice and Peace.
Vatican City, 14 December 2012 (VIS) - "Blessed are the Peacemakers" is the
title chosen by the Holy Father for his Message for the 46th World Day of
Peace, celebrated every year on 1 January. Given below is the full text of the
Message:
"1. Each new year brings the expectation of a better world. In light of
this, I ask God, the Father of humanity, to grant us concord and peace, so
that the aspirations of all for a happy and prosperous life may be
achieved.
"Fifty years after the beginning of the Second Vatican Council, which
helped to strengthen the Church’s mission in the world, it is heartening
to realise that Christians, as the People of God in fellowship with Him and
sojourning among mankind,
are committed within history to sharing humanity’s joys and hopes, grief
and anguish, as they proclaim the salvation of Christ and promote peace for
all.
"In effect, our times, marked by globalisation with its positive and
negative aspects, as well as the continuation of violent conflicts and threats
of war, demand a new, shared commitment in pursuit of the common good and the
development of all men,
and of the whole man.
"It is alarming to see hotbeds of tension and conflict caused by growing
instances of inequality between rich and poor, by the prevalence of a selfish
and individualistic mindset which also finds expression in an unregulated
financial capitalism. In
addition to the varied forms of terrorism and international crime, peace is
also endangered by those forms of fundamentalism and fanaticism which distort
the true nature of religion, which is called to foster fellowship and
reconciliation among
people.
"All the same, the many different efforts at peacemaking which abound in
our world testify to mankind’s innate vocation to peace. In every person
the desire for peace is an essential aspiration which coincides in a certain
way with the desire
for a full, happy and successful human life. In other words, the desire for
peace corresponds to a fundamental moral principle, namely, the duty and right
to an integral social and communitarian development, which is part of
God’s plan for
mankind. Man is made for the peace which is God’s gift.
"All of this led me to draw inspiration for this Message from the words of
Jesus Christ: 'Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children
of God'.
Gospel beatitude
"2. The beatitudes which Jesus proclaimed are promises. In the biblical
tradition, the beatitude is a literary genre which always involves some good
news, a 'gospel', which culminates in a promise. Therefore, the beatitudes are
not only moral
exhortations whose observance foresees in due time – ordinarily in the
next life – a reward or a situation of future happiness. Rather, the
blessedness of which the beatitudes speak consists in the fulfilment of a
promise made to all those
who allow themselves to be guided by the requirements of truth, justice and
love. In the eyes of the world, those who trust in God and His promises often
appear naïve or far from reality. Yet Jesus tells them that not only in
the next life, but
already in this life, they will discover that they are children of God, and
that God has always been, and ever will be, completely on their side. They
will understand that they are not alone, because He is on the side of those
committed to truth, justice and love. Jesus, the revelation of the
Father’s love, does not hesitate to offer Himself in self-sacrifice.
Once we accept Jesus Christ, God and man, we have the joyful experience of an
immense gift: the sharing of
God’s own life, the life of grace, the pledge of a fully blessed
existence. Jesus Christ, in particular, grants us true peace, which is born of
the trusting encounter of man with God.
"Jesus’ beatitude tells us that peace is both a messianic gift and
the fruit of human effort. In effect, peace presupposes a humanism open to
transcendence. It is the fruit of the reciprocal gift, of a mutual enrichment,
thanks to the gift
which has its source in God and enables us to live with others and for others.
The ethics of peace is an ethics of fellowship and sharing. It is
indispensable, then, that the various cultures in our day overcome forms of
anthropology and ethics based on
technical and practical suppositions which are merely subjectivistic and
pragmatic, in virtue of which relationships of coexistence are inspired by
criteria of power or profit, means become ends and vice versa, and culture and
education are centred on
instruments, technique and efficiency alone. The precondition for peace is the
dismantling of the dictatorship of relativism and of the supposition of a
completely autonomous morality which precludes acknowledgement of the
ineluctable natural moral law inscribed by God upon the conscience of every
man and woman. Peace is the building up of coexistence in rational and moral
terms, based on a foundation whose measure is not created by man, but rather
by God. As Psalm 29
puts it: 'May the Lord give strength to His people; may the Lord bless His
people with peace'.
Peace: God’s gift and the fruit of human effort
"3. Peace concerns the human person as a whole, and it involves complete
commitment. It is peace with God through a life lived according to His will.
It is interior peace with oneself, and exterior peace with our neighbours and
all creation. Above
all, as Blessed John XXIII wrote in his Encyclical Pacem in Terris, whose
fiftieth anniversary will fall in a few months, it entails the building up of
a coexistence based on truth, freedom, love and justice. The denial of what
makes up the true nature
of human beings in its essential dimensions, its intrinsic capacity to know
the true and the good and, ultimately, to know God Himself, jeopardises
peacemaking. Without the truth about man inscribed by the Creator in the human
heart, freedom and love
become debased, and justice loses the ground of its exercise.
"To become authentic peacemakers, it is fundamental to keep in mind our
transcendent dimension and to enter into constant dialogue with God, the
Father of mercy, whereby we implore the redemption achieved for us by His
only-begotten Son. In this way
mankind can overcome that progressive dimming and rejection of peace which is
sin in all its forms: selfishness and violence, greed and the will to power
and dominion, intolerance, hatred and unjust structures.
"The attainment of peace depends above all on recognizing that we are, in
God, one human family. This family is structured, as the Encyclical Pacem in
Terris taught, by interpersonal relations and institutions supported and
animated by a
communitarian 'we', which entails an internal and external moral order in
which, in accordance with truth and justice, reciprocal rights and mutual
duties are sincerely recognized. Peace is an order enlivened and integrated by
love, in such a way that
we feel the needs of others as our own, share our goods with others and work
throughout the world for greater communion in spiritual values. It is an order
achieved in freedom, that is, in a way consistent with the dignity of persons
who, by their very
nature as rational beings, take responsibility for their own actions.
"Peace is not a dream or something utopian; it is possible. Our gaze needs
to go deeper, beneath superficial appearances and phenomena, to discern a
positive reality which exists in human hearts, since every man and woman has
been created in the
image of God and is called to grow and contribute to the building of a new
world. God Himself, through the incarnation of His Son and His work of
redemption, has entered into history and has brought about a new creation and
a new covenant between God
and man, thus enabling us to have a 'new heart' and a 'new spirit'.
"For this very reason the Church is convinced of the urgency of a new
proclamation of Jesus Christ, the first and fundamental factor of the integral
development of peoples and also of peace. Jesus is indeed our peace, our
justice and our
reconciliation. The peacemaker, according to Jesus’ beatitude, is the
one who seeks the good of the other, the fullness of good in body and soul,
today and tomorrow.
"From this teaching one can infer that each person and every community,
whether religious, civil, educational or cultural, is called to work for
peace. Peace is principally the attainment of the common good in society at
its different levels, primary
and intermediary, national, international and global. Precisely for this
reason it can be said that the paths which lead to the attainment of the
common good are also the paths that must be followed in the pursuit of
peace.
Peacemakers are those who love, defend and promote life in its fullness
"4. The path to the attainment of the common good and to peace is above all
that of respect for human life in all its many aspects, beginning with its
conception, through its development and up to its natural end. True
peacemakers, then, are those
who love, defend and promote human life in all its dimensions, personal,
communitarian and transcendent. Life in its fullness is the height of peace.
Anyone who loves peace cannot tolerate attacks and crimes against life.
"Those who insufficiently value human life and, in consequence, support
among other things the liberalization of abortion, perhaps do not realize that
in this way they are proposing the pursuit of a false peace. The flight from
responsibility, which
degrades human persons, and even more so the killing of a defenceless and
innocent being, will never be able to produce happiness or peace. Indeed how
could one claim to bring about peace, the integral development of peoples or
even the protection of
the environment without defending the life of those who are weakest, beginning
with the unborn. Every offence against life, especially at its beginning,
inevitably causes irreparable damage to development, peace and the
environment. Neither is it just
to introduce surreptitiously into legislation false rights or freedoms which,
on the basis of a reductive and relativistic view of human beings and the
clever use of ambiguous expressions aimed at promoting a supposed right to
abortion and euthanasia, pose a threat to the fundamental right to life.
"There is also a need to acknowledge and promote the natural structure of
marriage as the union of a man and a woman in the face of attempts to make it
juridically equivalent to radically different types of union; such attempts
actually harm and help
to destabilize marriage, obscuring its specific nature and its indispensable
role in society.
"These principles are not truths of faith, nor are they simply a corollary
of the right to religious freedom. They are inscribed in human nature itself,
accessible to reason and thus common to all humanity. The Church’s
efforts to promote them
are not therefore confessional in character, but addressed to all people,
whatever their religious affiliation. Efforts of this kind are all the more
necessary the more these principles are denied or misunderstood, since this
constitutes an offence
against the truth of the human person, with serious harm to justice and
peace.
"Consequently, another important way of helping to build peace is for legal
systems and the administration of justice to recognize the right to invoke the
principle of conscientious objection in the face of laws or government
measures that offend
against human dignity, such as abortion and euthanasia.
"One of the fundamental human rights, also with reference to international
peace, is the right of individuals and communities to religious freedom. At
this stage in history, it is becoming increasingly important to promote this
right not only from
the negative point of view, as freedom from – for example, obligations
or limitations involving the freedom to choose one’s religion –
but also from the positive point of view, in its various expressions, as
freedom for – for
example, bearing witness to one’s religion, making its teachings known,
engaging in activities in the educational, benevolent and charitable fields
which permit the practice of religious precepts, and existing and acting as
social bodies
structured in accordance with the proper doctrinal principles and
institutional ends of each. Sadly, even in countries of long-standing
Christian tradition, instances of religious intolerance are becoming more
numerous, especially in
relation to Christianity and those who simply wear identifying signs of their
religion.
"Peacemakers must also bear in mind that, in growing sectors of public
opinion, the ideologies of radical liberalism and technocracy are spreading
the conviction that economic growth should be pursued even to the detriment of
the state’s social
responsibilities and civil society’s networks of solidarity, together
with social rights and duties. It should be remembered that these rights and
duties are fundamental for the full realisation of other rights and duties,
starting with those
which are civil and political.
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