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HIS FIRST TRIP TO THE U.S.
AS POPE - BENEDICT XVI IN 2008
Address to the U.N. General Assembly
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Go here for more about
 Pope
Benedict XVI.
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Benedict
XVI's Address to the U.N.
Photo above:
Paulo Filgueiras
It follows the full text transcript of
Pope Benedict XVI's Address to the United
Nations General Assembly, delivered at New York, N.Y. -
April 18, 2008. |
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Mr President,
Ladies and Gentlemen, |
As I begin my
address to this Assembly, I would like first of
all to express to you, Mr President, my sincere
gratitude for your kind words. My thanks go also
to the Secretary-General, Mr Ban Ki-moon, for
inviting me to visit the headquarters of this
Organization and for the welcome that he has
extended to me. I greet the Ambassadors and
Diplomats from the Member States, and all those
present. Through you, I greet the peoples who
are represented here. They look to this
institution to carry forward the founding
inspiration to establish a "center for
harmonizing the actions of nations in the
attainment of these common ends" of peace and
development (cf. Charter of the United Nations,
article 1.2-1.4). As Pope John Paul II expressed
it in 1995, the Organization should be "a moral
center where all the nations of the world feel
at home and develop a shared awareness of being,
as it were, a 'family of nations'" (Address to
the General Assembly of the United Nations on
the 50th Anniversary of its Foundation, New
York, 5 October 1995, 14).
Through the United Nations, States have
established universal objectives which, even if
they do not coincide with the total common good
of the human family, undoubtedly represent a
fundamental part of that good. The founding
principles of the Organization – the desire for
peace, the quest for justice, respect for the
dignity of the person, humanitarian cooperation
and assistance – express the just aspirations of
the human spirit, and constitute the ideals
which should underpin international relations.
As my predecessors Paul VI and John Paul II have
observed from this very podium, all this is
something that the Catholic Church and the Holy
See follow attentively and with interest, seeing
in your activity an example of how issues and
conflicts concerning the world community can be
subject to common regulation. The United Nations
embodies the aspiration for a "greater degree of
international ordering" (John Paul II,
Sollicitudo Rei Socialis, 43), inspired and
governed by the principle of subsidiary, and
therefore capable of responding to the demands
of the human family through binding
international rules and through structures
capable of harmonizing the day-to-day unfolding
of the lives of peoples. This is all the more
necessary at a time when we experience the
obvious paradox of a multilateral consensus that
continues to be in crisis because it is still
subordinated to the decisions of a few, whereas
the world's problems call for interventions in
the form of collective action by the
international community.
Indeed, questions of security, development
goals, reduction of local and global
inequalities, protection of the environment, of
resources and of the climate, require all
international leaders to act jointly and to show
a readiness to work in good faith, respecting
the law, and promoting solidarity with the
weakest regions of the planet. I am thinking
especially of those countries in Africa and
other parts of the world which remain on the
margins of authentic integral development, and
are therefore at risk of experiencing only the
negative effects of globalization. In the
context of international relations, it is
necessary to recognize the higher role played by
rules and structures that are intrinsically
ordered to promote the common good, and
therefore to safeguard human freedom. These
regulations do not limit freedom. On the
contrary, they promote it when they prohibit
behavior and actions which work against the
common good, curb its effective exercise and
hence compromise the dignity of every human
person. In the name of freedom, there has to be
a correlation between rights and duties, by
which every person is called to assume
responsibility for his or her choices, made as a
consequence of entering into relations with
others. Here our thoughts turn also to the way
the results of scientific research and
technological advances have sometimes been
applied. Notwithstanding the enormous benefits
that humanity can gain, some instances of this
represent a clear violation of the order of
creation, to the point where not only is the
sacred character of life contradicted, but the
human person and the family are robbed of their
natural identity. Likewise, international action
to preserve the environment and to protect
various forms of life on earth must not only
guarantee a rational use of technology and
science, but must also rediscover the authentic
image of creation. This never requires a choice
to be made between science and ethics: rather it
is a question of adopting a scientific method
that is truly respectful of ethical imperatives.
Recognition of the unity of the human family,
and attention to the innate dignity of every man
and woman, today find renewed emphasis in the
principle of the responsibility to protect. This
has only recently been defined, but it was
already present implicitly at the origins of the
United Nations, and is now increasingly
characteristic of its activity. Every State has
the primary duty to protect its own population
from grave and sustained violations of human
rights, as well as from the consequences of
humanitarian crises, whether natural or
man-made. If States are unable to guarantee such
protection, the international community must
intervene with the juridical means provided in
the United Nations Charter and in other
international instruments. The action of the
international community and its institutions,
provided that it respects the principles
undergirding the international order, should
never be interpreted as an unwarranted
imposition or a limitation of sovereignty. On
the contrary, it is indifference or failure to
intervene that do the real damage. What is
needed is a deeper search for ways of
pre-empting and managing conflicts by exploring
every possible diplomatic avenue, and giving
attention and encouragement to even the faintest
sign of dialogue or desire for reconciliation.
The principle of "responsibility to protect" was
considered by the ancient jus gentium as
the foundation of every action taken by those in
government with regard to the governed: at the
time when the concept of national sovereign
States was first developing, the Dominican Friar
Francisco de Vitoria, rightly considered as a
precursor of the idea of the United Nations,
described this responsibility as an aspect of
natural reason shared by all nations, and the
result of an international order whose task it
was to regulate relations between peoples. Now,
as then, this principle has to invoke the idea
of the person as image of the Creator, the
desire for the absolute and the essence of
freedom. The founding of the United Nations, as
we know, coincided with the profound upheavals
that humanity experienced when reference to the
meaning of transcendence and natural reason was
abandoned, and in consequence, freedom and human
dignity were grossly violated. When this
happens, it threatens the objective foundations
of the values inspiring and governing the
international order and it undermines the cogent
and inviolable principles formulated and
consolidated by the United Nations. When faced
with new and insistent challenges, it is a
mistake to fall back on a pragmatic approach,
limited to determining "common ground", minimal
in content and weak in its effect.
This reference to human dignity, which is the
foundation and goal of the responsibility to
protect, leads us to the theme we are
specifically focusing upon this year, which
marks the sixtieth anniversary of the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights. This document was
the outcome of a convergence of different
religious and cultural traditions, all of them
motivated by the common desire to place the
human person at the heart of institutions, laws
and the workings of society, and to consider the
human person essential for the world of culture,
religion and science. Human rights are
increasingly being presented as the common
language and the ethical substratum of
international relations. At the same time, the
universality, indivisibility and interdependence
of human rights all serve as guarantees
safeguarding human dignity. It is evident,
though, that the rights recognized and expounded
in the Declaration apply to everyone by virtue
of the common origin of the person, who remains
the high-point of God's creative design for the
world and for history. They are based on the
natural law inscribed on human hearts and
present in different cultures and civilizations.
Removing human rights from this context would
mean restricting their range and yielding to a
relativistic conception, according to which the
meaning and interpretation of rights could vary
and their universality would be denied in the
name of different cultural, political, social
and even religious outlooks. This great variety
of viewpoints must not be allowed to obscure the
fact that not only rights are universal, but so
too is the human person, the subject of those
rights.
The life of the community, both domestically and
internationally, clearly demonstrates that
respect for rights, and the guarantees that
follow from them, are measures of the common
good that serve to evaluate the relationship
between justice and injustice, development and
poverty, security and conflict. The promotion of
human rights remains the most effective strategy
for eliminating inequalities between countries
and social groups, and for increasing security.
Indeed, the victims of hardship and despair,
whose human dignity is violated with impunity,
become easy prey to the call to violence, and
they can then become violators of peace. The
common good that human rights help to accomplish
cannot, however, be attained merely by applying
correct procedures, nor even less by achieving a
balance between competing rights. The merit of
the Universal Declaration is that it has enabled
different cultures, juridical expressions and
institutional models to converge around a
fundamental nucleus of values, and hence of
rights. Today, though, efforts need to be
redoubled in the face of pressure to reinterpret
the foundations of the Declaration and to
compromise its inner unity so as to facilitate a
move away from the protection of human dignity
towards the satisfaction of simple interests,
often particular interests. The Declaration was
adopted as a "common standard of achievement"
(Preamble) and cannot be applied piecemeal,
according to trends or selective choices that
merely run the risk of contradicting the unity
of the human person and thus the indivisibility
of human rights.
Experience shows that legality often prevails
over justice when the insistence upon rights
makes them appear as the exclusive result of
legislative enactments or normative decisions
taken by the various agencies of those in power.
When presented purely in terms of legality,
rights risk becoming weak propositions divorced
from the ethical and rational dimension which is
their foundation and their goal. The Universal
Declaration, rather, has reinforced the
conviction that respect for human rights is
principally rooted in unchanging justice, on
which the binding force of international
proclamations is also based. This aspect is
often overlooked when the attempt is made to
deprive rights of their true function in the
name of a narrowly utilitarian perspective.
Since rights and the resulting duties follow
naturally from human interaction, it is easy to
forget that they are the fruit of a commonly
held sense of justice built primarily upon
solidarity among the members of society, and
hence valid at all times and for all peoples.
This intuition was expressed as early as the
fifth century by Augustine of Hippo, one of the
masters of our intellectual heritage. He taught
that the saying: Do not do to others what you
would not want done to you "cannot in any way
vary according to the different understandings
that have arisen in the world" (De Doctrina
Christiana, III, 14). Human rights, then, must
be respected as an expression of justice, and
not merely because they are enforceable through
the will of the legislators.
Ladies and Gentlemen, as history proceeds, new
situations arise, and the attempt is made to
link them to new rights. Discernment, that is,
the capacity to distinguish good from evil,
becomes even more essential in the context of
demands that concern the very lives and conduct
of persons, communities and peoples. In tackling
the theme of rights, since important situations
and profound realities are involved, discernment
is both an indispensable and a fruitful virtue.
Discernment, then, shows that entrusting
exclusively to individual States, with their
laws and institutions, the final responsibility
to meet the aspirations of persons, communities
and entire peoples, can sometimes have
consequences that exclude the possibility of a
social order respectful of the dignity and
rights of the person. On the other hand, a
vision of life firmly anchored in the religious
dimension can help to achieve this, since
recognition of the transcendent value of every
man and woman favors conversion of heart, which
then leads to a commitment to resist violence,
terrorism and war, and to promote justice and
peace. This also provides the proper context for
the inter-religious dialogue that the United
Nations is called to support, just as it
supports dialogue in other areas of human
activity. Dialogue should be recognized as the
means by which the various components of society
can articulate their point of view and build
consensus around the truth concerning particular
values or goals. It pertains to the nature of
religions, freely practiced, that they can
autonomously conduct a dialogue of thought and
life. If at this level, too, the religious
sphere is kept separate from political action,
then great benefits ensue for individuals and
communities. On the other hand, the United
Nations can count on the results of dialogue
between religions, and can draw fruit from the
willingness of believers to place their
experiences at the service of the common good.
Their task is to propose a vision of faith not
in terms of intolerance, discrimination and
conflict, but in terms of complete respect for
truth, coexistence, rights, and reconciliation.
Human rights, of course, must include the right
to religious freedom, understood as the
expression of a dimension that is at once
individual and communitarian – a vision that
brings out the unity of the person while clearly
distinguishing between the dimension of the
citizen and that of the believer. The activity
of the United Nations in recent years has
ensured that public debate gives space to
viewpoints inspired by a religious vision in all
its dimensions, including ritual, worship,
education, dissemination of information and the
freedom to profess and choose religion. It is
inconceivable, then, that believers should have
to suppress a part of themselves – their faith –
in order to be active citizens. It should never
be necessary to deny God in order to enjoy one's
rights. The rights associated with religion are
all the more in need of protection if they are
considered to clash with a prevailing secular
ideology or with majority religious positions of
an exclusive nature. The full guarantee of
religious liberty cannot be limited to the free
exercise of worship, but has to give due
consideration to the public dimension of
religion, and hence to the possibility of
believers playing their part in building the
social order. Indeed, they actually do so, for
example through their influential and generous
involvement in a vast network of initiatives
which extend from Universities, scientific
institutions and schools to health care agencies
and charitable organizations in the service of
the poorest and most marginalized. Refusal to
recognize the contribution to society that is
rooted in the religious dimension and in the
quest for the Absolute – by its nature,
expressing communion between persons – would
effectively privilege an individualistic
approach, and would fragment the unity of the
person.
My presence at this Assembly is a sign of esteem
for the United Nations, and it is intended to
express the hope that the Organization will
increasingly serve as a sign of unity between
States and an instrument of service to the
entire human family. It also demonstrates the
willingness of the Catholic Church to offer her
proper contribution to building international
relations in a way that allows every person and
every people to feel they can make a difference.
In a manner that is consistent with her
contribution in the ethical and moral sphere and
the free activity of her faithful, the Church
also works for the realization of these goals
through the international activity of the Holy
See. Indeed, the Holy See has always had a place
at the assemblies of the Nations, thereby
manifesting its specific character as a subject
in the international domain. As the United
Nations recently confirmed, the Holy See thereby
makes its contribution according to the
dispositions of international law, helps to
define that law, and makes appeal to it.
The United Nations remains a privileged setting
in which the Church is committed to contributing
her experience "of humanity", developed over the
centuries among peoples of every race and
culture, and placing it at the disposal of all
members of the international community. This
experience and activity, directed towards
attaining freedom for every believer, seeks also
to increase the protection given to the rights
of the person. Those rights are grounded and
shaped by the transcendent nature of the person,
which permits men and women to pursue their
journey of faith and their search for God in
this world. Recognition of this dimension must
be strengthened if we are to sustain humanity's
hope for a better world and if we are to create
the conditions for peace, development,
cooperation, and guarantee of rights for future
generations.
In my recent Encyclical, Spe Salvi, I
indicated that "every generation has the task of
engaging anew in the arduous search for the
right way to order human affairs" (no. 25). For
Christians, this task is motivated by the hope
drawn from the saving work of Jesus Christ. That
is why the Church is happy to be associated with
the activity of this distinguished Organization,
charged with the responsibility of promoting
peace and good will throughout the earth.
Dear Friends, I
thank you for this opportunity to address you
today, and I promise you of the support of my
prayers as you pursue your noble task.
Before I take my leave from this distinguished
Assembly, I should like to offer my greetings,
in the official languages, to all the Nations
here represented.
Peace and Prosperity with God's help!
Paix et prospérité, avec l'aide de Dieu!
Paz y prosperidad con la ayuda de Dios!
سَلامٌ وَإزْدِهَارٌ بعَوْن ِ الله ِ!
因著天主的幫助願大家 得享平安和繁榮 !
Мира и благоденствия с помощью Боҗией!
Thank you very much.
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