Scottish Catholic Observer

In his speech at the UN’s New York headquarters, the Holy Father also praised the recent deal struck over Iran’s nuclear capabilities and stressed the importance of the family.

The Pope began by praising the UN’s achievements—‘lights which help to dispel the darkness of the disorder caused by unrestrained ambitions and collective forms of selfishness.’

He called for the greater equality and singled out the UN’s financial bodies, which should ‘limit every kind of abuse or usury,’ ‘care for the sustainable development of countries’ and ‘ensure that they are not

subjected to oppressive lending systems which, far from promoting progress, subject people to mechanisms which generate greater poverty, exclusion and dependence.’

The Pope said that ‘no human individual or group can consider itself absolute, permitted to bypass the dignity and the rights of other individuals or their social groupings.’ Yet in today’s world, he said, there are victims of power badly excised, namely the natural environment and the ‘vast ranks of the excluded.’

The right of the environment exists, he said, because human beings are part of it and live in communion with it, and because ‘the universe is the fruit of a loving decision by the Creator.’

Misuse and destruction of the environment, the Holy Father said, is accompanied by a relentless process of exclusion.

“The poorest are those who suffer most from such offences, for three serious reasons: They are cast off by society, forced to live off what is discarded and suffer unjustly from the abuse of the environment. They are part of today’s widespread and quietly growing ‘culture of waste,’” he said.

Solemn commitments to fix these problems are not enough, he added.

The Pope called for education, particularly of girls, which is ‘ensured first and foremost by respecting and reinforcing the primary right of the family to educate its children, as well as the right of churches and social groups to support and assist families in the education of their children.’

“The ecological crisis, and the large-scale destruction of biodiversity, can threaten the very existence of the human species,” he said.

UN secretary General Ban Ki-moon said he was honoured to welcome the Pope to the UN as he was a leading voice for urgent action to reduce poverty, enhance human dignity and protect the planet, our common home.’

—This story ran in full in the Oct 2 edition print of the SCO, available in parishes.