Dear
Brothers in the Episcopate and the Priesthood,
Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen,
As you gather for the fifteenth Plenary Session of the
Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, I am pleased to have this
occasion to meet with you and to express my encouragement for
your mission of expounding and furthering the Church's social
doctrine in the areas of law, economy, politics and the various
other social sciences. Thanking Professor Mary Ann Glendon for
her cordial words of greeting, I assure you of my prayers that
the fruit of your deliberations will continue to attest to the
enduring pertinence of Catholic social teaching in a rapidly
changing world.
After studying work, democracy, globalisation, solidarity and
subsidiarity in relation to the social teaching of the Church,
your Academy has chosen to return to the central question of the
dignity of the human person and human rights, a point of
encounter between the doctrine of the Church and contemporary
society.
The world's great religions and philosophies have illuminated
some aspects of these human rights, which are concisely
expressed in "the golden rule" found in the Gospel: "Do to
others as you would have them do to you" (Lk 6:31; cf. Mt 7:12).
The Church has always affirmed that fundamental rights, above
and beyond the different ways in which they are formulated and
the different degrees of importance they may have in various
cultural contexts, are to be upheld and accorded universal
recognition because they are inherent in the very nature of man,
who is created in the image and likeness of God. If all human
beings are created in the image and likeness of God, then they
share a common nature that binds them together and calls for
universal respect. The Church, assimilating the teaching of
Christ, considers the person as "the worthiest of nature" (St.
Thomas Aquinas, De potentia, 9, 3) and has taught that the
ethical and political order that governs relationships between
persons finds its origin in the very structure of man's being.
The discovery of America and the ensuing anthropological debate
in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Europe led to a heightened
awareness of human rights as such and of their universality (ius
gentium). The modern period helped shape the idea that the
message of Christ - because it proclaims that God loves every
man and woman and that every human being is called to love God
freely - demonstrates that everyone, independently of his or her
social and cultural condition, by nature deserves freedom. At
the same time, we must always remember that "freedom itself
needs to be set free. It is Christ who sets it free" (Veritatis
Splendor, 86).
In the middle of the last century, after the vast suffering
caused by two terrible world wars and the unspeakable crimes
perpetrated by totalitarian ideologies, the international
community acquired a new system of international law based on
human rights. In this, it appears to have acted in conformity
with the message that my predecessor Benedict XV proclaimed when
he called on the belligerents of the First World War to
"transform the material force of arms into the moral force of
law" ("Note to the Heads of the Belligerent Peoples", 1 August
1917).
Human rights became the reference point of a shared universal
ethos - at least at the level of aspiration - for most of
humankind. These rights have been ratified by almost every State
in the world. The Second Vatican Council, in the Declaration
Dignitatis Humanae, as well as my predecessors Paul VI and John
Paul II, forcefully referred to the right to life and the right
to freedom of conscience and religion as being at the centre of
those rights that spring from human nature itself.
Strictly speaking, these human rights are not truths of faith,
even though they are discoverable - and indeed come to full
light - in the message of Christ who "reveals man to man
himself" (Gaudium et Spes, 22). They receive further
confirmation from faith. Yet it stands to reason that, living
and acting in the physical world as spiritual beings, men and
women ascertain the pervading presence of a logos which enables
them to distinguish not only between true and false, but also
good and evil, better and worse, and justice and injustice. This
ability to discern - this radical agency - renders every person
capable of grasping the "natural law", which is nothing other
than a participation in the eternal law: "unde...lex naturalis
nihil aliud est quam participatio legis aeternae in rationali
creatura" (St. Thomas Aquinas, ST I-II, 91, 2). The natural law
is a universal guide recognizable to everyone, on the basis of
which all people can reciprocally understand and love each
other. Human rights, therefore, are ultimately rooted in a
participation of God, who has created each human person with
intelligence and freedom. If this solid ethical and political
basis is ignored, human rights remain fragile since they are
deprived of their sound foundation.
The Church's action in promoting human rights is therefore
supported by rational reflection, in such a way that these
rights can be presented to all people of good will,
independently of any religious affiliation they may have.
Nevertheless, as I have observed in my Encyclicals, on the one
hand, human reason must undergo constant purification by faith,
insofar as it is always in danger of a certain ethical blindness
caused by disordered passions and sin; and, on the other hand,
insofar as human rights need to be re-appropriated by every
generation and by each individual, and insofar as human freedom
- which proceeds by a succession of free choices - is always
fragile, the human person needs the unconditional hope and love
that can only be found in God and that lead to participation in
the justice and generosity of God towards others (cf. Deus
Caritas Est, 18, and Spe Salvi, 24).
This perspective draws attention to some of the most critical
social problems of recent decades, such as the growing awareness
- which has in part arisen with globalisation and the present
economic crisis - of a flagrant contrast between the equal
attribution of rights and the unequal access to the means of
attaining those rights. For Christians who regularly ask God to
"give us this day our daily bread", it is a shameful tragedy
that one-fifth of humanity still goes hungry. Assuring an
adequate food supply, like the protection of vital resources
such as water and energy, requires all international leaders to
collaborate in showing a readiness to work in good faith,
respecting the natural law and promoting solidarity and
subsidiarity with the weakest regions and peoples of the planet
as the most effective strategy for eliminating social
inequalities between countries and societies and for increasing
global security.
Dear friends, dear Academicians, in exhorting you in your
research and deliberations to be credible and consistent
witnesses to the defence and promotion of these non-negotiable
human rights which are founded in divine law, I most willingly
impart to you my Apostolic Blessing.
Look at the One they
Pierced!
