eupope

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CONFERRAL OF THE CHARLEMAGNE PRIZE

ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS

Sala Regia
Friday, 6 May 2016

Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen,

I offer you a cordial welcome and I thank you for your presence. I am particularly grateful to Messrs Marcel Philipp, Jürgen Linden, Martin Schulz, Jean-Claude Juncker and Donald Tusk for their kind words. I would like to reiterate my intention to offer this prestigious award for Europe. For ours is not so much a celebration as a moment to express our shared hope for a new and courageous step forward for this beloved continent.

Creativity, genius and a capacity for rebirth and renewal are part of the soul of Europe. In the last century, Europe bore witness to humanity that a new beginning was indeed possible. After years of tragic conflicts, culminating in the most horrific war ever known, there emerged, by God’s grace, something completely new in human history. The ashes of the ruins could not extinguish the ardent hope and the quest of solidarity that inspired the founders of the European project. They laid the foundations for a bastion of peace, an edifice made up of states united not by force but by free commitment to the common good and a definitive end to confrontation. Europe, so long divided, finally found its true self and began to build its house.

This “family of peoples”,[1] which has commendably expanded in the meantime, seems of late to feel less at home within the walls of the common home. At times, those walls themselves have been built in a way varying from the insightful plans left by the original builders. Their new and exciting desire to create unity seems to be fading; we, the heirs of their dream, are tempted to yield to our own selfish interests and to consider putting up fences here and there. Nonetheless, I am convinced that resignation and weariness do not belong to the soul of Europe, and that even “our problems can become powerful forces for unity”.[2]

In addressing the European Parliament, I used the image of Europe as a grandmother. I noted that there is a growing impression that Europe is weary, aging, no longer fertile and vital, that the great ideals that inspired Europe seem to have lost their appeal. There is an impression that Europe is declining, that it has lost its ability to be innovative and creative, and that it is more concerned with preserving and dominating spaces than with generating processes of inclusion and change. There is an impression that Europe is tending to become increasingly “entrenched”, rather than open to initiating new social processes capable of engaging all individuals and groups in the search for new and productive solutions to current problems. Europe, rather than protecting spaces, is called to be a mother who generates processes (cf. Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, 223).

What has happened to you, the Europe of humanism, the champion of human rights, democracy and freedom? What has happened to you, Europe, the home of poets, philosophers, artists, musicians, and men and women of letters? What has happened to you, Europe, the mother of peoples and nations, the mother of great men and women who upheld, and even sacrificed their lives for, the dignity of their brothers and sisters?

The writer Elie Wiesel, a survivor of the Nazi death camps, has said that what we need today is a “memory transfusion”. We need to “remember”, to take a step back from the present to listen to the voice of our forebears. Remembering will help us not to repeat our past mistakes (cf. Evangelii Gaudium, 108), but also to re-appropriate those experiences that enabled our peoples to surmount the crises of the past. A memory transfusion can free us from today’s temptation to build hastily on the shifting sands of immediate results, which may produce “quick and easy short-term political gains, but do not enhance human fulfilment” (ibid., 224).

To this end, we would do well to turn to the founding fathers of Europe. They were prepared to pursue alternative and innovative paths in a world scarred by war. Not only did they boldly conceive the idea of Europe, but they dared to change radically the models that had led only to violence and destruction. They dared to seek multilateral solutions to increasingly shared problems.

Robert Schuman, at the very birth of the first European community, stated that “Europe will not be made all at once, or according to a single plan. It will be built through concrete achievements which first create a de facto solidarity”.[3] Today, in our own world, marked by so much conflict and suffering, there is a need to return to the same de facto solidarity and concrete generosity that followed the Second World War, because, as Schuman noted, “world peace cannot be safeguarded without making creative efforts proportionate to the dangers threatening it”.[4] The founding fathers were heralds of peace and prophets of the future. Today more than ever, their vision inspires us to build bridges and tear down walls. That vision urges us not to be content with cosmetic retouches or convoluted compromises aimed at correcting this or that treaty, but courageously to lay new and solid foundations. As Alcide De Gasperi stated, “equally inspired by concern for the common good of our European homeland”, all are called to embark fearlessly on a “construction project that demands our full quota of patience and our ongoing cooperation”.[5]

Such a “memory transfusion” can enable us to draw inspiration from the past in order to confront with courage the complex multipolar framework of our own day and to take up with determination the challenge of “updating” the idea of Europe. A Europe capable of giving birth to a new humanism based on three capacities: the capacity to integrate, the capacity for dialogue and the capacity to generate.

The capacity to integrate

Erich Przywara, in his splendid work Idee Europa [The Idea of Europe], challenges us to think of the city as a place where various instances and levels coexist. He was familiar with the reductionist tendency inherent in every attempt to rethink the social fabric. Many of our cities are remarkably beautiful precisely because they have managed to preserve over time traces of different ages, nations, styles and visions. We need but look at the inestimable cultural patrimony of Rome to realize that the richness and worth of a people is grounded in its ability to combine all these levels in a healthy coexistence. Forms of reductionism and attempts at uniformity, far from generating value, condemn our peoples to a cruel poverty: the poverty of exclusion. Far from bestowing grandeur, riches and beauty, exclusion leads to vulgarity, narrowness, and cruelty. Far from bestowing nobility of spirit, it brings meanness.

The roots of our peoples, the roots of Europe, were consolidated down the centuries by the constant need to integrate in new syntheses the most varied and discrete cultures. The identity of Europe is, and always has been, a dynamic and multicultural identity.

Political activity cannot fail to see the urgency of this fundamental task. We know that “the whole is greater than the part, but it is also greater than the sum of the parts”, and this requires that we work to “broaden our horizons and see the greater good which will benefit us all” (Evangelii Gaudium, 235). We are asked to promote an integration that finds in solidarity a way of acting, a means of making history. Solidarity should never be confused with charitable assistance, but understood as a means of creating opportunities for all the inhabitants of our cities – and of so many other cities – to live with dignity. Time is teaching us that it is not enough simply to settle individuals geographically: the challenge is that of a profound cultural integration.

The community of European peoples will thus be able to overcome the temptation of falling back on unilateral paradigms and opting for forms of “ideological colonization”. Instead, it will rediscover the breadth of the European soul, born of the encounter of civilizations and peoples. The soul of Europe is in fact greater than the present borders of the Union and is called to become a model of new syntheses and of dialogue. The true face of Europe is seen not in confrontation, but in the richness of its various cultures and the beauty of its commitment to openness. Without this capacity for integration, the words once spoken by Konrad Adenauer will prove prophetic: “the future of the West is not threatened as much by political tensions as by the danger of conformism, uniformity of thoughts and feelings: in a word, by the whole system of life, by flight from responsibility, with concern only for oneself.”[6]

The capacity for dialogue

If there is one word that we should never tire of repeating, it is this: dialogue. We are called to promote a culture of dialogue by every possible means and thus to rebuild the fabric of society. The culture of dialogue entails a true apprenticeship and a discipline that enables us to view others as valid dialogue partners, to respect the foreigner, the immigrant and people from different cultures as worthy of being listened to. Today we urgently need to engage all the members of society in building “a culture which privileges dialogue as a form of encounter” and in creating “a means for building consensus and agreement while seeking the goal of a just, responsive and inclusive society” (Evangelii Gaudium, 239). Peace will be lasting in the measure that we arm our children with the weapons of dialogue, that we teach them to fight the good fight of encounter and negotiation. In this way, we will bequeath to them a culture capable of devising strategies of life, not death, and of inclusion, not exclusion.

This culture of dialogue should be an integral part of the education imparted in our schools, cutting across disciplinary lines and helping to give young people the tools needed to settle conflicts differently than we are accustomed to do. Today we urgently need to build “coalitions” that are not only military and economic, but cultural, educational, philosophical and religious. Coalitions that can make clear that, behind many conflicts, there is often in play the power of economic groups. Coalitions capable of defending people from being exploited for improper ends. Let us arm our people with the culture of dialogue and encounter.

The capacity to generate

Dialogue, with all that it entails, reminds us that no one can remain a mere onlooker or bystander. Everyone, from the smallest to the greatest, has an active role to play in the creation of an integrated and reconciled society. This culture of dialogue can come about only if all of us take part in planning and building it. The present situation does not permit anyone to stand by and watch other people’s struggles. On the contrary, it is a forceful summons to personal and social responsibility.

In this sense, our young people have a critical role. They are not the future of our peoples; they are the present. Even now, with their dreams and their lives they are forging the spirit of Europe. We cannot look to the future without offering them the real possibility to be catalysts of change and transformation. We cannot envision Europe without letting them be participants and protagonists in this dream.

Lately I have given much thought to this. I ask myself: How we can involve our young people in this building project if we fail to offer them employment, dignified labour that lets them grow and develop through their handiwork, their intelligence and their abilities? How can we tell them that they are protagonists, when the levels of employment and underemployment of millions of young Europeans are continually rising? How can we avoid losing our young people, who end up going elsewhere in search of their dreams and a sense of belonging, because here, in their own countries, we don’t know how to offer them opportunities and values?

The just distribution of the fruits of the earth and human labour is not mere philanthropy. It is a moral obligation.[7] If we want to rethink our society, we need to create dignified and well-paying jobs, especially for our young people.

To do so requires coming up with new, more inclusive and equitable economic models, aimed not at serving the few, but at benefiting ordinary people and society as a whole. This calls for moving from a liquid economy to a social economy; I think for example of the social market economy encouraged by my predecessors (cf. JOHN PAUL II, Address to the Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany, 8 November 1990). It would involve passing from an economy directed at revenue, profiting from speculation and lending at interest, to a social economy that invests in persons by creating jobs and providing training.

We need to move from a liquid economy prepared to use corruption as a means of obtaining profits to a social economy that guarantees access to land and lodging through labour. Labour is in fact the setting in which individuals and communities bring into play “many aspects of life: creativity, planning for the future, developing talents, living out values, relating to others, giving glory to God. It follows that, in the reality of today’s global society, it is essential that we ‘continue to prioritize the role of access to steady employment for everyone, no matter the limited interests of business and dubious economic reasoning’[8]” (Encyclical Laudato Si’, 127).

If we want a dignified future, a future of peace for our societies, we will only be able to achieve it by working for genuine inclusion, “an inclusion which provides worthy, free, creative, participatory and solidary work”.[9] This passage (from a liquid economy to a social economy) will not only offer new prospects and concrete opportunities for integration and inclusion, but will makes us once more capable of envisaging that humanism of which Europe has been the cradle and wellspring.

To the rebirth of a Europe weary, yet still rich in energies and possibilities, the Church can and must play her part. Her task is one with her mission: the proclamation of the Gospel, which today more than ever finds expression in going forth to bind the wounds of humanity with the powerful yet simple presence of Jesus, and his mercy that consoles and encourages. God desires to dwell in our midst, but he can only do so through men and women who, like the great evangelizers of this continent, have been touched by him and live for the Gospel, seeking nothing else. Only a Church rich in witnesses will be able to bring back the pure water of the Gospel to the roots of Europe. In this enterprise, the path of Christians towards full unity is a great sign of the times and a response to the Lord’s prayer “that they may all be one” (Jn 17:21).

With mind and heart, with hope and without vain nostalgia, like a son who rediscovers in Mother Europe his roots of life and faith, I dream of a new European humanism, one that involves “a constant work of humanization” and calls for “memory, courage, [and] a sound and humane utopian vision”.[10] I dream of a Europe that is young, still capable of being a mother: a mother who has life because she respects life and offers hope for life. I dream of a Europe that cares for children, that offers fraternal help to the poor and those newcomers seeking acceptance because they have lost everything and need shelter. I dream of a Europe that is attentive to and concerned for the infirm and the elderly, lest they be simply set aside as useless. I dream of a Europe where being a migrant is not a crime but a summons to greater commitment on behalf of the dignity of every human being. I dream of a Europe where young people breathe the pure air of honesty, where they love the beauty of a culture and a simple life undefiled by the insatiable needs of consumerism, where getting married and having children is a responsibility and a great joy, not a problem due to the lack of stable employment. I dream of a Europe of families, with truly effective policies concentrated on faces rather than numbers, on birth rates more than rates of consumption. I dream of a Europe that promotes and protects the rights of everyone, without neglecting its duties towards all. I dream of a Europe of which it will not be said that its commitment to human rights was its last utopia. Thank you.

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ADDRESS OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS
TO THE HEADS OF STATE AND GOVERNMENT OF THE EUROPEAN UNION
IN ITALY FOR THE CELEBRATION OF THE 60th ANNIVERSARY OF THE TREATY OF ROME

Sala Regia
Friday, 24 March 2017

Distinguished Guests,

I thank you for your presence here tonight, on the eve of the sixtieth anniversary of the signing of the Treaties instituting the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Community. I convey to each of you the affection of the Holy See for your respective countries and for Europe itself, to whose future it is, in God’s providence, inseparably linked. I am particularly grateful to the Honourable Paolo Gentiloni, President of the Council of Ministers of the Republic of Italy, for his respectful words of greeting in your name and for the efforts that Italy has made in preparing for this meeting. I also thank the Honourable Antonio Tajani, President of the European Parliament, who has voiced the aspirations of the peoples of the Union on this anniversary.

Returning to Rome, sixty years later, must not simply be a remembrance of things past, but the expression of a desire to relive that event in order to appreciate its significance for the present. We need to immerse ourselves in the challenges of that time, so as to face those of today and tomorrow. The Bible, with its rich historical narratives, can teach us a basic lesson. We cannot understand our own times apart from the past, seen not as an assemblage of distant facts, but as the lymph that gives life to the present. Without such an awareness, reality loses its unity, history loses its logical thread, and humanity loses a sense of the meaning of its activity and its progress towards the future.

25 March 1957 was a day full of hope and expectation, enthusiasm and apprehension. Only an event of exceptional significance and historical consequences could make it unique in history. The memory of that day is linked to today’s hopes and the expectations of the people of Europe, who call for discernment in the present, so that the journey that has begun can continue with renewed enthusiasm and confidence.

This was very clear to the founding fathers and the leaders who, by signing the two Treaties, gave life to that political, economic, cultural and primarily human reality which today we call the European Union. As P.H. Spaak, the Belgian Minister of Foreign Affairs stated, it was a matter “indeed, of the material prosperity of our peoples, the expansion of our economies, social progress and completely new industrial and commercial possibilities, but above all… a particular conception of life that is humane, fraternal and just”.[1]

After the dark years and the bloodshed of the Second World War, the leaders of the time had faith in the possibility of a better future. “They did not lack boldness, nor did they act too late. The memory of recent tragedies and failures seems to have inspired them and given them the courage needed to leave behind their old disputes and to think and act in a truly new way, in order to bring about the greatest transformation… of Europe”.[2]

The founding fathers remind us that Europe is not a conglomeration of rules to obey, or a manual of protocols and procedures to follow. It is a way of life, a way of understanding man based on his transcendent and inalienable dignity, as something more than simply a sum of rights to defend or claims to advance. At the origin of the idea of Europe, we find “the nature and the responsibility of the human person, with his ferment of evangelical fraternity…, with his desire for truth and justice, honed by a thousand-year-old experience”.[3] Rome, with its vocation to universality,[4] symbolizes that experience and was thus chosen as the place for the signing of the Treaties. For here – as the Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs, J. Luns, observed – “were laid the political, juridical and social foundations of our civilization”.[5]

It was clear, then, from the outset, that the heart of the European political project could only be man himself. It was also clear that the Treaties could remain a dead letter; they needed to take on spirit and life. The first element of European vitality must be solidarity. As the Prime Minister of Luxembourg, J. Bech stated, “the European economic community will prove lasting and successful only if it remains constantly faithful to the spirit of European solidarity that created it, and if the common will of the Europe now being born proves more powerful than the will of individual nations”.[6] That spirit remains as necessary as ever today, in the face of centrifugal impulses and the temptation to reduce the founding ideals of the Union to productive, economic and financial needs.

Solidarity gives rise to openness towards others. “Our plans are not inspired by self-interest”,[7] said the German Chancellor, K. Adenauer. The French Minister of Foreign Affairs, C. Pineau, echoed this sentiment: “Surely the countries about to unite… do not have the intention of isolating themselves from the rest of the world and surrounding themselves with insurmountable barriers”.[8] In a world that was all too familiar with the tragedy of walls and divisions, it was clearly important to work for a united and open Europe, and for the removal of the unnatural barrier that divided the continent from the Baltic Sea to the Adriatic. What efforts were made to tear down that wall! Yet today the memory of those efforts has been lost. Forgotten too is the tragedy of separated families, poverty and destitution born of that division. Where generations longed to see the fall of those signs of forced hostility, these days we debate how to keep out the “dangers” of our time: beginning with the long file of women, men and children fleeing war and poverty, seeking only a future for themselves and their loved ones.

In today’s lapse of memory, we often forget another great achievement of the solidarity ratified on 25 March 1957: the longest period of peace experienced in recent centuries. “Peoples who over time often found themselves in opposed camps, fighting with one another… now find themselves united and enriched by their distinctive national identities”.[9] Peace is always the fruit of a free and conscious contribution by all. Nonetheless, “for many people today, peace appears as a blessing to be taken for granted”,[10] one that can then easily come to be regarded as superfluous. On the contrary, peace is a precious and essential good, for without it, we cannot build a future for anyone, and we end up “living from day to day”.

United Europe was born of a clear, well-defined and carefully pondered project, however embryonic at first. Every worthy project looks to the future, and the future are the young, who are called to realize its hopes and promises.[11] The founding fathers had a clear sense of being part of a common effort that not only crossed national borders, but also the borders of time, so as to bind generations among themselves, all sharing equally in the building of the common home.

Distinguished Guests,

I have devoted this first part of my talk to the founding fathers of Europe, so that we can be challenged by their words, the timeliness of their thinking, their impassioned pursuit of the common good, their certainty of sharing in a work greater than themselves, and the breadth of the ideals that inspired them. Their common denominator was the spirit of service, joined to passion for politics and the consciousness that “at the origin of European civilization there is Christianity”,[12] without which the Western values of dignity, freedom and justice would prove largely incomprehensible. As Saint John Paul II affirmed: “Today too, the soul of Europe remains united, because, in addition to its common origins, those same Christian and human values are still alive. Respect for the dignity of the human person, a profound sense of justice, freedom, industriousness, the spirit of initiative, love of family, respect for life, tolerance, the desire for cooperation and peace: all these are its distinctive marks”.[13] In our multicultural world, these values will continue to have their rightful place provided they maintain a vital connection to their deepest roots. The fruitfulness of that connection will make it possible to build authentically “lay” societies, free of ideological conflicts, with equal room for the native and the immigrant, for believers and nonbelievers.

The world has changed greatly in the last sixty years. If the founding fathers, after surviving a devastating conflict, were inspired by the hope of a better future and were determined to pursue it by avoiding the rise of new conflicts, our time is dominated more by the concept of crisis. There is the economic crisis that has marked the past decade; there is the crisis of the family and of established social models; there is a widespread “crisis of institutions” and the migration crisis. So many crises that engender fear and profound confusion in our contemporaries, who look for a new way of envisioning the future. Yet the term “crisis” is not necessarily negative. It does not simply indicate a painful moment to be endured. The word “crisis” has its origin in the Greek verb kríno, which means to discern, to weigh, to assess. Ours is a time of discernment, one that invites us to determine what is essential and to build on it. It is a time of challenge and opportunity.

So what is the interpretative key for reading the difficulties of the present and finding answers for the future? Returning to the thinking of the founding Fathers would be fruitless unless it could help to point out a path and provide an incentive for facing the future and a source of hope. When a body loses its sense of direction and is no longer able to look ahead, it experiences a regression and, in the long run, risks dying. What, then, is the legacy of the founding fathers? What prospects do they indicate for surmounting the challenges that lie before us? What hope do they offer for the Europe of today and of tomorrow?

Their answers are to be found precisely in the pillars on which they determined to build the European economic community. I have already mentioned these: the centrality of man, effective solidarity, openness to the world, the pursuit of peace and development, openness to the future. Those who govern are charged with discerning the paths of hope – you are charged with discerning the paths of hope – identifying specific ways forward to ensure that the significant steps taken thus far have not been wasted, but serve as the pledge of a long and fruitful journey.

Europe finds new hope when man is the centre and the heart of her institutions. I am convinced that this entails an attentive and trust-filled readiness to hear the expectations voiced by individuals, society and the peoples who make up the Union. Sadly, one frequently has the sense that there is a growing “split” between the citizenry and the European institutions, which are often perceived as distant and inattentive to the different sensibilities present in the Union. Affirming the centrality of man also means recovering the spirit of family, whereby each contributes freely to the common home in accordance with his or her own abilities and gifts. It helps to keep in mind that Europe is a family of peoples[14] and that – as in every good family – there are different sensitivities, yet all can grow to the extent that all are united. The European Union was born as a unity of differences and a unity in differences. What is distinctive should not be a reason for fear, nor should it be thought that unity is preserved by uniformity. Unity is instead harmony within a community. The founding fathers chose that very term as the hallmark of the agencies born of the Treaties and they stressed that the resources and talents of each were now being pooled. Today the European Union needs to recover the sense of being primarily a “community” of persons and peoples, to realize that “the whole is greater than the part, but it is also greater than the sum of its parts”,[15] and that therefore “we constantly have to broaden our horizons and see the greater good which will benefit us all”.[16] The founding fathers sought that harmony in which the whole is present in every one of the parts, and the parts are – each in its own unique way – present in the whole.

Europe finds new hope in solidarity, which is also the most effective antidote to modern forms of populism. Solidarity entails the awareness of being part of a single body, while at the same time involving a capacity on the part of each member to “sympathize” with others and with the whole. When one suffers, all suffer (cf. 1 Cor 12:26). Today, with the United Kingdom, we mourn the victims of the attack that took place in London two days ago. For solidarity is no mere ideal; it is expressed in concrete actions and steps that draw us closer to our neighbours, in whatever situation they find themselves. Forms of populism are instead the fruit of an egotism that hems people in and prevents them from overcoming and “looking beyond” their own narrow vision. There is a need to start thinking once again as Europeans, so as to avert the opposite dangers of a dreary uniformity or the triumph of particularisms. Politics needs this kind of leadership, which avoids appealing to emotions to gain consent, but instead, in a spirit of solidarity and subsidiarity, devises policies that can make the Union as a whole develop harmoniously. As a result, those who run faster can offer a hand to those who are slower, and those who find the going harder can aim at catching up to those at the head of the line.

Europe finds new hope when she refuses to yield to fear or close herself off in false forms of security. Quite the contrary, her history has been greatly determined by encounters with other peoples and cultures; hers “is, and always has been, a dynamic and multicultural identity”.[17] The world looks to the European project with great interest. This was the case from the first day, when crowds gathered in Rome’s Capitol Square and messages of congratulation poured in from other states. It is even more the case today, if we think of those countries that have asked to become part of the Union and those states that receive the aid so generously offered them for battling the effects of poverty, disease and war. Openness to the world implies the capacity for “dialogue as a form of encounter”[18] on all levels, beginning with dialogue between member states, between institutions and citizens, and with the numerous immigrants landing on the shores of the Union. It is not enough to handle the grave crisis of immigration of recent years as if it were a mere numerical or economic problem, or a question of security. The immigration issue poses a deeper question, one that is primarily cultural. What kind of culture does Europe propose today? The fearfulness that is becoming more and more evident has its root cause in the loss of ideals. Without an approach inspired by those ideals, we end up dominated by the fear that others will wrench us from our usual habits, deprive us of familiar comforts, and somehow call into question a lifestyle that all too often consists of material prosperity alone. Yet the richness of Europe has always been her spiritual openness and her capacity to raise basic questions about the meaning of life. Openness to the sense of the eternal has also gone hand in hand, albeit not without tensions and errors, with a positive openness to this world. Yet today’s prosperity seems to have clipped the continent’s wings and lowered its gaze. Europe has a patrimony of ideals and spiritual values unique in the world, one that deserves to be proposed once more with passion and renewed vigour, for it is the best antidote against the vacuum of values of our time, which provides a fertile terrain for every form of extremism. These are the ideals that shaped Europe, that “Peninsula of Asia” which stretches from the Urals to the Atlantic.

Europe finds new hope when she invests in development and in peace. Development is not the result of a combination of various systems of production. It has to do with the whole human being: the dignity of labour, decent living conditions, access to education and necessary medical care. “Development is the new name of peace”,[19] said Pope Paul VI, for there is no true peace whenever people are cast aside or forced to live in dire poverty. There is no peace without employment and the prospect of earning a dignified wage. There is no peace in the peripheries of our cities, with their rampant drug abuse and violence.

Europe finds new hope when she is open to the future. When she is open to young people, offering them serious prospects for education and real possibilities for entering the work force. When she invests in the family, which is the first and fundamental cell of society. When she respects the consciences and the ideals of her citizens. When she makes it possible to have children without the fear of being unable to support them. When she defends life in all its sacredness.

Distinguished Guests,

Nowadays, with the general increase in people’s life span, sixty is considered the age of full maturity, a critical time when we are once again called to self-examination. The European Union, too, is called today to examine itself, to care for the ailments that inevitably come with age, and to find new ways to steer its course. Yet unlike human beings, the European Union does not face an inevitable old age, but the possibility of a new youthfulness. Its success will depend on its readiness to work together once again, and by its willingness to wager on the future. As leaders, you are called to blaze the path of a “new European humanism”[20] made up of ideals and concrete actions. This will mean being unafraid to take practical decisions capable of meeting people’s real problems and of standing the test of time.

For my part, I readily assure you of the closeness of the Holy See and the Church to Europe as a whole, to whose growth she has, and always will, continue to contribute. Invoking upon Europe the Lord’s blessings, I ask him to protect her and grant her peace and progress. I make my own the words that Joseph Bech proclaimed on Rome’s Capitoline Hill: Ceterum censeo Europam esse aedificandam – furthermore, I believe that Europe ought to be built.

Thank you.

[1] P.H. SPAAK, Address on the Signing of the Treaties of Rome, 25 March 1957.

[2] Ibid.

[3] A. DE GASPERI. La nostra patria Europa. Address to the European Parliamentary Conference, 21 April 1954, in Alcide De Gasperi e la politica internazionale, Cinque Lune, Rome, 1990, vol. III, 437-440.

[4] Cf. P.H. SPAAK, loc. cit.

[5] J. LUNS, Address on the Signing of the Treaties of Rome, 25 March 1957.

[6] J. BECH, Address on the Signing of the Treaties of Rome, 25 March 1957.

[7] K. ADENAUER, Address on the Signing of the Treaties of Rome, 25 March 1957.

[8] C. PINEAU, Address on the Signing of the Treaties of Rome, 25 March 1957.

[9] P.H. SPAAK, loc. cit.

[10] Address to Members of the Diplomatic Corps Accredited to the Holy See, 9 January 2017.

[11] Cf. P.H. SPAAK, loc. cit.

[12] A. DE GASPERI, loc. cit.

[13] JOHN PAUL II, European Act, Santiago de Compostela, 9 November 1982: AAS 75/1 (1983), 329.

[14] Cf. Address to the European Parliament, Strasbourg, 25 November 2014: AAS 106 (2014), 1000.

[15] Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, 235.

[16] Ibid.

[17] Address at the Conferral of the Charlemagne Prize, 6 May 2016: L’Osservatore Romano, 6-7 May 2016, p. 4.

[18] Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, 239.

[19] PAUL VI, Encyclical Letter Populorum Progressio, 26 March 1967, 87: AAS 59 (1967), 299.

[20] Address at the Conferral of the Charlemagne Prize, loc. cit., p. 5.

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 JOHN PAUL II

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 JOHN PAUL II

ANGELUS

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

1. My thoughts turn once more to the current process of European integration and especially to the determinant role of its institutions.

I am thinking in the first place of the European Union, involved in seeking new forms of openness, encounter and collaboration between its member States.

I think, moreover, of the Council of Europe, with its headquarters in Strasbourg and of the attached European Court of Human Rights, which carry out the noble task of creating a Europe of freedom, justice and solidarity.

Finally, it is necessary to mention the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe which is committed to promoting the cause of the fundamental freedom of the persons and nations of the continent.

2. I follow in prayer the laborious drafting of the Constitutional Treaty of the European Union, now being studied by the governments of the various countries. I am confident that those who are devoting their energies to it will always be motivated by the conviction that "a proper ordering of society must be rooted in authentic ethical and civil values shared as widely as possible by its citizens" (Apostolic Exhortation Ecclesia in Europa, n. 114).

For her part, the Catholic Church is convinced that the Gospel of Christ, which has been a unifying element of the European peoples for many centuries should be and continue to be today too an inexhaustible source of spirituality and fraternity. Taking note of this is for the benefit of all, and an explicit recognition of the Christian roots of Europe in the Treaty represents the principle guarantee for the continent's future.

3. Let us invoke Mary Most Holy, so that in the building of the Europe of today and tomorrow, that spiritual inspiration which is indispensable to ensure authentic action at the service of humanity, may never be lacking. Such an inspiration finds in the Gospel a sure guarantee in favour of the freedom, justice and peace of all, believers and non-believers.

After the Angelus the Holy Father greeted the pilgrims in French, English, German, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian. To the English-speaking pilgrims he said:

I am pleased to greet the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors present at this Angelus prayer. Upon you and your families I cordially invoke God's blessings of joy and peace.

INTERVENTION BY THE HOLY SEE
TO THE 24th CONFERENCE OF
EUROPEAN MINISTERS OF JUSTICE* 

Moscow
Thursday 4 October 2001

Mr President,

This conference is taking place at a crucial moment in the life of the international community after the tragic event on 11 September last, described by the Pope at the General Audience of 12 September, as "a dark day in the history of humanity".

The decision to include the topic of terrorism in our agenda was timely and relevant, for the criminal act that caused the United States of America such great suffering - and I am keen to reiterate to the American delegation present here the profound solidarity of the Holy See - could not be ignored at a meeting of the European Ministers of Justice.

During his recent visit to Kazakhstan, the Holy Father declared: "Hatred, fanaticism and terrorism profane the name of God and disfigure the true image of man" (Address to representatives of the world of culture, art and science, Astana, Kazakhstan, 24 September 2001).

Commitment to the fight against terrorism demands us to act with determination at various levels. Among these, juridical action, both legislative and judicial, has full importance:  close cooperation between the member States of the Council of Europe is both desirable and necessary.

However, it should be stressed that this activity will not suffice to uproot violent behaviour which, depending on the case, can originate in highly complex situations that are often marked by real or perceived injustice.

Without the courageous political will to solve the difficult problems that are arising in these situations, the perverse spiral of terrorism will never cease to tempt and harrass individuals and groups who see recourse to this wicked and unacceptable practice as an effective or even legitimate form of combat.

Ministers of Justice should not forget that peace is the fruit of justice; a justice which, even when it strikes to sanction criminal acts, must not forget, as Pope John Paul II says, "that it must always be carried out with mercy and love" (30 September 2001).

*L'Osservatore Romano. Weekly Edition in English n.42 p.2.

http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/secretariat_state/documents/rc_seg-st_doc_20011005_mons-zur-mosca_en.html

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Pope John-Paul II and the Council of Europe 

(To be checked against delivered speech)

Speech of His Holiness Pope John-Paul II before the Court and the Commission of Human Rights

Strasbourg, 8 October 1988

Esteemed Presidents,
Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

By leaving the Hall of the Assembly and meeting again in this Palace of Human Rights, we are giving visible expression, as it were, to the organic relationship which unites the Council of Europe and the two distinguished Institutions which you embody.

Indeed, the European Commission and the European Court of Human Rights are emblematic of the lofty ideals and noble spirit which inspired the European Convention of Human Rights signed in Rome in 1950.

In you, distinguished judges and men and women of the legal profession, I salute the devotion of your peoples to the spiritual and moral values which are their common heritage. I greet each one of you and I pay honour to the Court's and the Commission's record of service to the strengthening of a civilization of freedom and justice in our times.

Indeed, the Court and the Commission form a unique judicial reality in international law and have become a model which other regional organizations around the world are seeking to imitate. These two Institutions bear witness that the member Nations of the Council of Europe recognize, not only that human rights and fundamental freedoms antecede the States which have the responsibility of seeing to it that they are respected, but that these rights transcend national boundaries themselves.

Such judicial progress is the result of a maturing of the concept of human rights and of the manner in which they are observed. In fact the idea of “human rights" implies not just a catalogue of positive rights, but a body of underlying values, which the Convention rightly calls the “common heritage" of ideals and principles of the Nations of Europe.

There is no doubt that the notion of “human rights”, especially as it was enshrined in the 1948 “Universal Declaration" of the United Nations, has become a kind of common good of the whole of humanity. But this notion, which is based on a precise understanding of the individual person and of his or her relationship to the State, needs institutional and juridical safeguards in order that its effective implementation be guaranteed.

In particular, there can be no certain implementation of human rights where the rule of law does not prevail. Your Court is, as it were, the epitome of a juridical system that guarantees the pre-eminence of the rule of law. The fact that an individual can appeal against a government must surely be seen as a positive development of the rule of law.

Governments which respect the rule of law acknowledge, in effect, a limit to their powers and sphere of interests. Because such governments recognize that they are themselves subject to the law and not above it, they can effectively acknowledge the legitimate inviolability of the private sphere in the life of their citizens and defend it against outside constraint.

Public authorities and those responsible for civil life can have no more sublime goal than to safeguard effectively those essential rights and freedoms which are the expression of the inalienable dignity of the human person.

The rule of law, moreover, is inseparable from the exercise of civil and political rights, which were the first to have been defined historically. The tragic experience of two World Wars on European soil has taught that human rights are secure only when those who wield power are accountable to their fellow citizens and when their tenure in office is subject to some form of public control. Progress in promoting human rights also entails free public debate regarding political and social priorities as well as objectives to be pursued. Time and again it has been shown that the participation of a people in forging their own political destiny ensures a public life that promotes human values and inalienable human rights, including the rights of minorities and of the poor and “powerless”.

Economic, social and cultural rights, which the member Nations of the Council of Europe have been greatly successful in codifying, notably with the “European Social Charter" ensure the external structural framework of human rights and fundamental personal freedoms. But these rights themselves can only be effectively applied where they can be freely debated and defined.

The Europe that you represent has wisely discarded the illusion that the State can claim to embody the social concerns of its people while at the same time depriving those people of their civil and political rights.

The spiritual and moral values which the Council of Europe recognizes as the common heritage of its peoples constitute an almost inexhaustible source of new developments in the juridical sphere. So, one speaks today of “a third generation of human rights": among which, for example, is the right to a safe and healthy natural environment.

It is one of the noble tasks of your Court to promote such developments, in particular by creating a jurisprudence which contributes to the elimination of all arbitrariness in relations between individuals and States. In effect, only when it is possible for an individual to juridically invoke respect for a particular freedom can one speak of human rights being effectively guaranteed.

Distinguished Ladies and Gentlemen,

In this solemn setting I cannot but reaffirm the Church's deep concern for matters relating to human rights and freedoms. The Church's commitment in this field corresponds fully to her religious and moral mission. The Church vigorously defends human rights because she considers them a necessary part of the recognition that must be given to the dignity of the human person created in the image of God and redeemed by Christ.

Her specific concern for human rights proceeds from a statement of fact and rests on a conviction.

The statement of fact is that the human rights of which we are speaking draw their vigour and their effectiveness from a framework of values, the roots of which lie deep within the Christian heritage which has contributed so much to European culture. These founding values precede the positive law which gives them expression and of which they are the basis. They also precede the philosophical rationale that the various schools of thought are able to give to them.

The conviction in that, within the sphere of the freedom of conscience and of religion which the rule of law should guarantee, the Church cannot renounce her mission to teach the message that has been entrusted to her. Her teaching, moreover, upholds the very values which form the substance of what constitutes human dignity. Her mission contributes to ensuring that those values will continue to be affirmed and lived.

In a word, the Church in the ally of all those who defend authentic human freedoms. For freedom is inseparable from the Truth which every human being seeks and which makes human beings truly free. In the words of the Gospel of Saint John: “you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free” (John 8:32).

Thank you for your attention.

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ADDRESS OF JOHN PAUL II
TO THE MEMBERS OF THE PARLIAMENTARY ASSEMBLY
OF THE COUNCIL OF EUROPE*

Monday, 29 March 1999

Mr President,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

1. I am pleased to welcome the members of the Office of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and the members of the various Parliamentary Committees: for Political Affairs, for Legal Affairs and Human Rights, for Migration, Refugees and Demography. In particular, I greet your President, Lord Russel Johnston, and thank him for his kind words. I also extend my greetings to the Clerk of the Assembly, Mr Bruno Haller.

This year you are celebrating the 50th anniversary of the creation of the Council of Europe. The work accomplished in half a century has been an eminent service to the peoples of Europe. Even if the difficulties encountered on the path of democracy and human rights were and are considerable, you have maintained the goal set from the start by the Statutes of the Council of Europe: to unite the peoples of Europe more closely on the basis of the heritage of their common values.

2. During these 50 years, moral and spiritual values have proven their fruitfulness and their ability to transform society, as the events which occurred almost 10 years ago in Europe have shown. Today they must remain the basis for continuing to build the European project.

We should first of all remember that there is no just political, economic or social process without respect for the dignity of each person, with all the consequences to be drawn concerning human rights, freedom, democracy, solidarity and freedom.

These values are deeply rooted in the European conscience; they represent the strongest aspirations of European citizens. They must inspire every project which has the noble aim of uniting the peoples of this continent. Your efforts to express these values and aspirations in terms of law, respect for freedoms and democratic progress are essential; by tirelessly putting the human person and his inalienable dignity at the heart of your concerns and decisions, you will make a lasting contribution to the construction of Europe and will serve the human person and all humanity.

3. Here I would like to mention the war being waged at our doorstep, in Kosovo, which is wounding Europe as a whole. I urgently ask that everything be done so that peace can be established in the region and that the civilian populations can live in fraternity on their land. In response to violence, further violence is never a promising way to exit from a crisis. It is thus fitting to silence arms and acts of vengeance in order to engage in negotiations that oblige the parties, with their desire to reach as soon as possible an agreement that will respect the different peoples and diverse cultures, which are called to build a common society respectful of basic liberties. Such a development can then be recorded in history as a new element promoting the construction of Europe.

4. Moreover, I join my voice to the Council of Europe's in asking that the most basic right, the right to life, be recognized throughout Europe and that the death penalty be abolished. This first and inalienable right to live does not only imply that every human being should be able to survive, but that he should be able to live in just and worthy conditions. In particular, how long do we still have to wait until the right to peace is recognized as a fundamental right throughout Europe and is put into practice by all public leaders? Many people are forced to live in fear and insecurity. I appreciate the efforts made by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and by the other European organizations to implement this right to peace and to alleviate the sufferings of peoples tried by war and violence. Human rights must also be extended in social life. On this subject, we appreciate the fact that, since the Second Strasbourg Summit (1997), the Council of Europe has wanted to give new vitality to society.

5. In the same spirit, it is important not to neglect the creation of a serious family policy which guarantees the rights of married couples and children; this is particularly necessary for social cohesion and stability. I invite the national parliaments to redouble their efforts to support the basic cell of society, which is the family, and to give it its proper place; it is the essential place for socialization, as well as a resource of security and confidence for the new European generations. I am also delighted to see a new solidarity growing among the peoples of Europe, since the continent represents a unity rich in great cultural and human diversity, despite the artificial ideological barriers built with the passing of time.

6. Your Assembly recently declared that "democracy and religion are not incompatible, on the contrary.... Religion, through its moral and ethical commitment, the values it defends, its critical sense and its cultural expression, can be a worthwhile partner of democratic society" (Recommendation 1396 (1999), n. 5). The Holy See appreciates this Recommendation, since it gives the spiritual life and the involvement of religions in social life and in the service of the human person their rightful place. This reminds us that religions have a particular contribution to make to the construction of Europe, and that they are a leaven for achieving a closer union among peoples.

At the end of our meeting, I encourage you to pursue your mission so that the Europe of tomorrow will first be a Europe of citizens and peoples who together build a more just and fraternal society, from which violence and the rejection of every human being's fundamental dignity will be banned. As I entrust you to the intercession of Sts Benedict, Cyril and Methodius, patrons of Europe, I willingly impart my Apostolic Blessing to you, to your families and to all your loved ones.

*L'Osservatore Romano. Weekly Edition in English n. 15 p.8.

Pope John-Paul II and the Council of Europe 

Speech of His Holiness Pope John-Paul II before the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly

8 October 1988

Mr President, Your Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,

1. I am happy to be able today to visit the Council of Europe and to address its Parliamentary Assembly in Strasbourg, a city whose history bears witness to its European vocation. I wholeheartedly thank the President, Mr Louis Jung, for the kind words he has just spoken, and I am most grateful to the Secretary General, Mr Marcelino Oreja, for having been so kind as to repeat the invitation he made to me several years ago.

You have given me the opportunity once again to express the esteem in which the Catholic church holds an institution whose work it follows closely by means of a Permanent Mission. Your Council has the great and fine vocation of bringing the nations of this continent closer together in order to consolidate "peace based upon justice", "for the preservation of human society and civilisation", in an unshakeable commitment to "the spiritual and moral values which are the common heritage of their peoples", to quote only a few key terms from the preamble to your Statute. Next year, the Council of Europe will celebrate the 40th anniversary of its foundation. That will be the occasion for your Assembly, representing the democratic institutions of 21 countries, to take stock of much work that has been achieved to satisfy the expectations of nations, to serve an ideal of freedom, tolerance and the rule of Law.

2. Immediately after the second world conflict, which started in Europe, the need was keenly felt to overcome antagonism between the nations which had just done battle. The resolve was expressed to unite the belligerents of yesterday in fellowship and to institutionalise their co-operation. I shall never forget how, amidst the turmoil, the voice of Pope Pius XII was raised to proclaim the "inviolable dignity of Man", the "true freedom of Man" (cf radio message of Christmas 1944). It is fitting that we should pay tribute to the clearsighted men who contrived to meet across frontiers, to set aside old enmities, to propose and bring to fruition the project of this Council destined to become a place where Europe may achieve self-awareness, where it measures the tasks that it needs to accomplish in response to the anxieties and the expectations of its citizens, where it undertakes necessary co-operation in many arduous fields. I know that you are faithful to the memory of those whom you call the "founding fathers" of Europe, such as Jean Monnet, Konrad Adenauer, Alcide de Gasperi, Robert Schuman. From the last-named, I shall borrow the description of the central intuition of those founders: "To serve humanity at last freed of hatred and fear, relearning Christian brotherhood after years of conflict" (Pour 1'Europe, P. 46).

3. It is true that the men and women of this old continent with its turbulent history need to be made freshly aware of the basis of their common identity, of what lives on as their vast shared memory. Admittedly, European identity is not easy to pin down. The distant sources of this civilisation are many, coming from Greece and Rome, from a Celtic, Germanic and Slavic basis profoundly remoulded by Christianity. And we know what a diversity of languages, cultures and legal traditions has marked nations, regions and also institutions. Yet, by comparison with other continents, Europe stands out as a single unit, even if its cohesion is less clearly perceived by those of whom it is composed. This way of looking at it may help Europe the better to re-discover its identity.

Over nearly 20 centuries, Christianity has helped to forge a conception of the world and of Man which today remains a fundamental attribute, whatever the divisions, weaknesses and even neglect of Christians themselves. I should like to mention here just a few essential features. The Christian message translates such a close relationship of Man to his creator that it places value on all aspects of life, starting with physical life: the body and the cosmos are the work and the gift of God. Faith in God the Creator has de-mythified the cosmos and offered it to Man for rational investigation. Controlling their own bodies and dominating the earth, men and women deploy abilities which are in turn "creative": in the Christian vision, Man far from despising the physical universe, makes use of it freely and without fear. This positive vision has contributed extensively to Europeans' development of science and technology.

At peace with the cosmos, Christian Man has also learned to respect the priceless value of each and every person, created in the image of God and redeemed by Christ. Gathered together in families, in cities, peoples, human beings do not live and labour in vain: Christianity teaches them that history is not a random cycle perpetually re-beginning, but that it finds meaning in the alliance which God offers men in order to invite them freely to accept his reign.

4. The biblical conception of Man has enabled Europeans to develop a lofty notion of the dignity of the person, which remains an essential value even amongst people who do not subscribe to a religious faith. The Church affirms that there is in Man an awareness which cannot be explained solely by the influences that are brought to bear on it, an awareness capable of knowing its own dignity and receptive to the absolute, an awareness which is the source of fundamental choices guided by the search for good for oneself and others, an awareness which is the locus of responsible freedom.

It is true that there has been much aberration, and Christians know that they have had their share in it. The human person, as the only subject of rights and duties, has often yielded his place to the individual, a prisoner of his own selfishness considering himself as his own end. Conversely, exaltation of the group, the nation or the race has sometimes led to murderous totalitarian ideologies. In many places, practical or theoretical materialism has misunderstood Man's spiritual nature and dramatically reduced his reasons for living. The merit of the democracies is that they seek to organise society in such a way that the person is not only respected in all his aspects, but participates in the common endeavour by exercising his free will.

5. Your Council has shown itself faithful to the heritage of European awareness in setting itself the major task of proclaiming and protecting human rights. By ratifying the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, the member states have sought to tighten their union around the highest principles and values of European tradition. In order to ensure their application everywhere, they have set up the European Court and Commission of Human Rights, according them jurisdiction and judicial authority unique in international organisations.

As the thinking of your Assembly on many aspects of life in society bears witness, taking into consideration the rights and dignity of the human person goes far beyond what is defined in the specific texts concerning human rights. The Church considers that Man has a right to freedom and to the safety he needs to lead his life according to the demands of his conscience, his spiritual receptiveness to the absolute and his vocation for brotherly living. Among the fields which affect what is most profound in Man, there are several on which it must express its point of view.

6. The family is probably the reality in which the interaction between personal responsibility and social conditions is most clearly apparent. Recent developments in European society have made the equilibrium and stability of families more difficult. That is the result of economic factors related to work - particularly women's work - housing, travel, voluntary migration and forced exile. Furthermore, we observe conceptions spreading which reduce the value attached to love, separate sexuality from the communion of life which it expresses, weaken the stable bonds which a truly human love entails. Therein lies a real danger, for the family is being destabilised and is disintegrating. Falling population trends are a sign of a family crisis which gives cause for concern.

In this situation, Europeans must restore to the family its value as the key element in social life. They must contrive to create conditions favouring its stability, enabling it to receive and to give life generously! They must realise the dignity of the responsibilities exercised by each human being in his home for the support and happiness of others! The family as such has rights that must be more clearly recognised.

I can mention these concerns only briefly here. You know how much importance the Catholic church attaches to them, to the point of having proposed a "Family Rights Charter". Everything concerning the family is a concern which Christian communities explore in the light of their faith, but which they share with everyone who believes in human dignity.

7. One of the most impressive aspects of scientific development concerns biology and medicine. Often, in your committees, you have to consider questions raised by the new possibilities for intervening at various stages of life, going beyond the limits of the therapies habitually practised. Genetic processes can be helped, but also impaired. Biogenetic processes can interfere with the natural link between parent and child. The diagnosis of pre-natal pathology too easily leads to abortion, whereas its legitimate purpose is therapeutic in nature. Experiments on human embryos open the way to unacceptable manipulation. It also happens that serious interventions are accepted simply because scientific progress has made them possible.

Your Assembly frequently has to reflect on these questions, which are fundamentally ethical in nature. Respect for human dignity must never be lost sight of, from the moment of conception to the last stages of disease or the most serious conditions of failure of mental faculties. You will understand my repeating here the Church's conviction: the human being for ever keeps his value as a person, because life is a gift of God. The weakest have a right to protection, to care, to affection from those around them and from society. The Church's insistence on safeguarding all life from conception onwards is inspired solely by an ethical requirement derived from what man is, and from which a free and enlightened conscience cannot remain aloof. The Church is aware of the serious dilemmas that face many couples as well as doctors and health counsellors; it is aware of their suffering and their doubts; it would ask, however, that conscience should not be distorted and that authentically human fraternity should never fail. It welcomes the progress achieved for the protection of the life of the unborn child preserving the integrity of his natural genetic heritage and developing effective therapies. In setting limits of an ethical nature on man's action on man, your institution will fulfil its role of critical conscience in the service of the community.

8. It will seem natural to you, ladies and gentlemen, that I emphasise the scope of the work patiently conducted by your Council in the field of social affairs. You offered Europe a Social Charter which seeks to further the dignity of all workers, harmonious human relations in the world of work, the possibility for all of providing decently for their needs through employment adapted to their abilities. This is no mean task, even though your countries are relatively favoured by comparison with many other parts of the world.

The most urgent problem underlying all co-operation is primarily that of actual access to employment; for too many years, this continent has been stricken by an employment crisis, harshly affecting men and women, who are prevented from providing for their own and their families' needs by following the occupation for which they are trained. Is it unrealistic to ask that when economic decisions are being made, account should be taken of the ordeal of those who, with their work, lose a part of their dignity and sometimes even hope itself? Accordingly, the Church would wish to encourage all efforts undertaken to ensure true solidarity among the citizens of nations; solidarity, as a human and Christian "virtue" is a way not only of compensating for loss of resources, but also includes the determination and boldness necessary to achieve better sharing of activity.

Nor must we lose sight of the areas of poverty within the very nations that form the Council. Substantial efforts are being made to identify them and to remedy the marginal situations in which the most disadvantaged find themselves.

9. In the context to which I have just referred, we naturally think of young people. It is up to them to give the community of nations drive and generosity for peace and solidarity in a world capable of tackling constantly changing problems. I shall say so to the thousands of young Europeans whom I shall be meeting this evening. I know that it is the wish of your Council to encourage progress In education, in order to enable everyone to develop their faculties of Intelligence and to realise their desire to act.

What training do we offer young people? Agreeing here with the studies and activities conducted within your Council, I wish simply to emphasise one essential aspect. The training of young people assumes its full human dimension when the acquisition of knowledge and the learning of techniques are placed in the context of the integral truth of man. At a time when material goods and technology are tending to take precedence over the claims of the spirit, ought we not to be reminded that there is no science without "con-science"? In initiating young people to knowledge, our aim is to help them discover the grandeur of man's destiny.

10. One often hears regrets expressed about young people's indifference to the cultural heritage built up by the peoples of Europe over more than two millennia. There is also anxiety about the very conservation of that heritage. If I briefly mention this question after talking about education, it is because I believe that this continent's incomparable cultural heritage must not simply be preserved in order to be available to be looked at with the remote or indifferent gaze which is reserved for vestiges of the past. It is important to be able, from one generation to another, to transmit, to pass on tokens of a living culture, works, discoveries and experiences which have progressively contributed to shaping man in Europe. That is why I wish to encourage the remarkable efforts made not only to save the riches of the past from extinction, but to make of them the wealth of today. These efforts will match the reality of this continent all the better if a great tradition is developed in exchanges from one region to another, whereby an artist or an intellectual feels just as much at home in Flanders as in Italy, in Portugal as in Sweden, on the banks of the Rhine as on those of the Danube. Young people in particular are receptive to cultural exchange, let us enable them to take over the many achievements of their fathers, to be familiar with the past, the better to prepare them for. taking the initiative in their turn and nurturing their creative abilities.

11. Ladies and gentlemen, if Europe wishes to be true to itself, it must contrive to gather together all the live forces of this continent, respecting the character of each region, but finding in its roots a common spirit. The member countries of your Council are aware that they are not the whole of Europe: in expressing the fervent wish for intensification of co-operation, already sketched out, with other nations, particularly in Central and Eastern Europe, I feel that I share the desire of millions of men and women who know that they are linked by a common history and who hope for a destiny of unity and solidarity on the scale of this whole continent.

For centuries, Europe played a considerable role in other parts of the world. It must be admitted that it did not always show its best side in its encounters with other civilisations, but no-one can contest that it did felicitously share many of the values which it had matured over a long period. Its sons played a key part in disseminating the Christian message. If Europe today wishes to play a part, it must, in unity, calmly base its action on what is most human and most generous in its heritage.

Good relations with the countries of the various parts of the world cannot stop at political or economic bargaining. With the growth in contacts between people of all continents, we feel in a new way how necessary it is that there should be understanding between human communities with different traditions. I am sure that this was the approach underlying the campaign recently mounted to stimulate and further north-south relations. Indeed, in the framework of universal solidarity, Europe has a responsibility towards that part of the world.

An important token of the seriousness of that desire for peace and understanding may be seen in the quality of the welcome afforded to anyone arriving from elsewhere, be he a partner from the outset or someone compelled to seek refuge. Christians for their part, who are themselves endeavouring to rebuild their unity, wish also to show their respect for those of other religions present in their regions, and wish to maintain clear and fraternal dialogue with them.

Peace depends on this respect for the cultural and spiritual identity of peoples. May Europeans found upon this conviction their disinterested contribution to the good of all nations!

Mr President, Ladies and Gentlemen,

In coming here today, before the world's first ever international parliamentary assembly, I am aware of addressing the qualified representatives of peoples who, loyal to their vital origins, wished to join together to consolidate their unity and to open their arms to other nations of all continents, in respect for the truth of man. I can bear witness to the willingness of Christians to take an active part in the work of your institutions. I wish for your Council that it may work fruitfully in order to make Europe's soul ever more living and generous.

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Friday, 3 November 2000

Ladies and Gentlemen,

1. I am pleased to welcome you today on the occasion of the Ministerial Conference being held under the Presidency of Italy to commemorate the Fiftieth Anniversary of the signing in Rome on 4 November 1950 of the European Convention on Human Rights. I greet the Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Mr Walter Schwimmer, the President of the Parliamentary Assembly, Lord Johnston, and its Secretary General, Mr Bruno Haller.

2. After the Second World War, the Council of Europe adopted a new political vision and embodied a new juridical order, enshrining the principle that respect for human rights transcends national sovereignty and cannot be subordinated to political aims or compromised by national interests. In doing so, the Council helped to lay the foundation for the moral recovery needed after the ravages of the War, and the European Convention on Human Rights proved a vital element of that process.

The Convention was a truly historic document, and it remains a unique legal instrument, seeking to proclaim and safeguard the fundamental rights of every citizen of the signatory States. It was a concrete and creative response to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which in 1948 had emerged from the tragic experience of the War and was deeply rooted in the twofold conviction of the centrality of the human person and the unity of the human family. As such, the Convention represented an important moment in the maturing of the sense of the innate dignity of the human person and the awareness of the rights and duties which flow from this.

It is significant too that, after their liberation from an alien ideology and totalitarian forms of government, the new democracies of Eastern Europe turned to the Council of Europe as the focus of unity for all the peoples of the continent, a unity which cannot be conceived without the religious and moral values which are the common heritage of all the European nations. Their desire to become parties to the European Convention on Human Rights reflects the will to safeguard the fundamental liberties which had for so long been denied them. In this respect, my conviction has always been that the peoples of Europe, East and West, deeply united by history and culture, share a common destiny. At the heart of our common European heritage – religious, cultural and juridical – is the notion of the inviolable dignity of the human person, which implies inalienable rights conferred not by governments or institutions but by the Creator alone, in whose image human beings have been made (cf. Gen 1:26).

3. Through the years, the Holy See has been involved in the Council of Europe, seeking in its own distinctive way to accompany and aid the Council’s ever more extensive work in the field of human rights. Conscious of the unique role which the European Court of Human Rights plays in the affairs of Europe, the Holy See has been especially interested in the jurisprudence of the Court. The Judges are the guardians of the Convention and its vision of human rights, and I am happy to have the occasion today to welcome the President of the Court, Lucius Wildhaber, with the other honourable Judges, and to wish you well in your noble and demanding task.

The Fiftieth Anniversary of the Convention is a time to give thanks for what has been achieved and to renew our commitment to making human rights ever more fully and widely respected in Europe. It is therefore a time to recognize clearly the problems that must be addressed if this is to happen. Fundamental among these is the tendency to separate human rights from their anthropological foundation – that is, from the vision of the human person that is native to European culture. There is also a tendency to interpret rights solely from an individualistic perspective, with little consideration of the role of the family as "the fundamental unit of society" (Universal Declaration of Human Rights, art. 16). And there is the paradox that, on the one hand, the need to respect human rights is vigorously affirmed while, on the other, the most basic of them all – the right to life – is denied. The Council of Europe has succeeded in having the death penalty removed from the legislation of the large majority of its member States. While rejoicing in this noble achievement and looking forward to its extension to the rest of the world, it is my fervent hope that the moment will soon come when it will be equally understood that an enormous injustice is committed when innocent life in the womb is not safeguarded. This radical contradiction is possible only when freedom is sundered from the truth inherent in the reality of things, and democracy divorced from transcendent values.

4. For all the problems now evident and the challenges which lie ahead, we must be confident that the true genius of Europe will emerge in a rediscovery of the human and spiritual wisdom intrinsic to the European heritage of respect for human dignity and the rights which stem from it. As we move into the third millennium, the Council of Europe is called to consolidate the sense of a common European good. Only on this condition will the continent, East and West, make its specific and uniquely important contribution to the good of the entire human family. Praying fervently that this will be so, I invoke upon you, your families and your efforts in the service of the peoples of Europe the abundant blessings of Almighty God.

L'Osservatore Romano 4.11. 2000 p.5.

L'Osservatore Romano. Weekly Edition in English n.45 p.4.

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