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(Vatican Radio) The global Catholic peace network Pax Christi International has welcomed Pope Francis’ message for World Peace Day, calling on the Church to invest in non-violent ways of resolving wars and conflicts.

The message, entitled ‘Non-violence: A style of politics for peace’ was published in December to mark the Catholic Church’s observance of World Peace Day on January 1st.

In the message the Pope notes that violence leads to suffering through forced migrations, environmental destruction, terrorism and organized crime, as well as a deadly cycle of retaliation that ends up benefiting merely a few warlords.

Among those welcoming the Pope’s words is Marie Dennis, co-president of Pax Christi International and former director of the Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns. A mother of six, she has also served on the White House Task Force on Global Poverty and Development and writes regularly on peacebuilding from a Catholic perspective.

Marie spoke to Philippa Hitchen about the significance of this message and about a recent Rome conference on non-violence which Pax Christi jointly sponsored:

Listen: 

Marie Dennis says the global Pax Christi community is “just delighted” with the message that Pope Francis sent out for this New Year, noting that it is, significantly, the 50th annual World Peace Day message. She recalls the meeting, cosponsored by the Pontifical Justice and Peace Council and Pax Christi international last April, noting that participants made a proposal to the Vatican to make non-violence the theme for this January 1st message and praising Pope Francis for what she calls “a really extraordinary document on theme of non-violence”.

Reflecting Jesus' teaching

Marie says Pope Francis makes “very clear” that active non-violence is not mere passivity or withdrawing from engagement in a very violent world. Rather, she says, It is a way of life and a spirituality, but also “a powerful set of tools to help us respond” to threats of extreme violence and danger. She says the Pope takes an important step in the direction of non-violence as a message for the Catholic community worldwide, showing that our way of engaging the world has to reflect the life and teachings of Jesus.

Investing intellectual and financial resources

Marie says we live “in a challenging world” in which the suggestion of responding to violence with active, strategic non-violence is often written off as “utopian”. But, she insists, ”we believe, with Pope Francis, that addressing the deep roots of violence and the long-term needs of local communities” is more likely to produce a lasting and just peace. She says a glance at the consequences of past centuries of responding to violence with more violence, shows why it is important to redirect the “intellectual and financial resources, plus the creativity that the global family has spent developing the tools of war”, investing instead in developing the tools of active non-violence that could go a lot further in responding, even to very dangerous situations.

Long-term prevention strategies

Marie Dennis says response to the Pope’s message has been mixed, with a remarkable number of people in the Catholic community and beyond recognizing the significance of a move in this direction. At same time, she says, there’s a concern that “this is just too utopian an idea” for the real world and the challenge now is “to generate conversations about this within our own communities”, and to question how we might move to thinking in different ways about conflict resolution.  What if the Church as an institution, she asks, began to engage with and advocate at a national and multilateral level on how to prevent the emergence of extremist groups? What if it focused on responding in more creative ways to long term conflicts in Syria, Iraq or Nigeria?

Coherent theological development

While many people fear a repudiation of the traditional Catholic framework of response, enshrined in the ‘just war’ theory, Marie insists that this message is “very consistent with where the Church has been moving theologically over the last century” as more and more situations have evidenced where active, strategic non-cooperation has been very effective in resolving conflicts. Our request as a conference last spring, she says, was to ask the Church to put the ‘just war’ theory aside for a while and to invest more energy and resources in “developing a new framework to help our world move beyond perpetual war and violence”.

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India's top court on Monday prohibited politicians from using religion and caste to garner votes, a verdict that could force political parties to change their strategy in upcoming elections.  "No politician can seek vote in the name of caste, creed or religion," said Chief Justice T.S. Thakur in an order, adding that election process must be a "secular exercise".  India is officially secular but political parties have traditionally used religion and caste as the main criteria to select candidates and to appeal to voters.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has for years fought elections on a Hindu nationalist agenda, with party members in the past being accused of making anti-Muslim statements to polarise Hindu voters.  The court ruling comes just weeks ahead of a state election in Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state where the two issues of religion and caste generally dominate campaigns.  Results of the election will be important for Modi's expected bid for a second term in 2019.  State elections are also due this year in the states of Punjab, Uttarakhand, Goa and Manipur. 

The Supreme Court, ruling on a petition filed by a politician in 1996, wrote in its opinion that the secular ethos of the constitution had to be protected.  The majority view of the seven-judge Supreme Court bench held that elections would be void if a politician made an appeal for votes on the basis of religious sentiment.  (Source: Reuter) 

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(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has written to the Bishops of the world condemning all forms of oppression and exploitation of children. His words come in a letter signed on the Feast of the Holy Innocents, which takes place each year on December 28, during the Octave of Christmas. 

In his letter, the Holy Father calls the Bishops to foster in hearts of Christians the joy that comes from the proclamation of the birth of Christ. But in moving words, he notes that the Christmas story is also accompanied by tears. “Today, too,” the Pope said, we hear this heart-rending cry of pain, which we neither desire nor are able to ignore or to silence.” He continued.  “In our world – I write this with a heavy heart – we continue to hear the lamentation of so many mothers, of so many families, for the death of their children, their innocent children.”

Pope Francis speaks about the millions of children who are deprived of education and whose innocence is shattered by wars and forced immigation. He also once again begs forgiveness for the sufferings of children who were sexually abused by priests, saying "it is a sin that shames the Church." 

Christian joy, he said, “is born from a call – the same call that Saint Joseph received – to embrace and protect human life, especially that of the holy innocents of our own day.” Pope Francis said the Bishops must find new courage to protect children and to be more sensitive to what is happening in the world around us.

Here is the full text of the Pope’s letter:

Dear Brother,

Today, on the feast of the Holy Innocents, as the words of the angel to the shepherds still resound in our hearts – “I bring you good news of a great joy which will come to all the people; for to you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour” (Lk 2: 10-11) – I feel the need to write to you. We do well to listen to that proclamation again and again; to hear over and over again that God is present in the midst of our people. This certainty, which we renew each year, is the source of our joy and hope.

In these days we experience how the liturgy leads us to the heart of Christmas, into the Mystery which gradually draws us to the source of Christian joy.

As pastors, we are called to help foster this joy among the faithful. We are charged with protecting this joy. I ask you once again that we not let ourselves be robbed of this joy, for we can be disillusioned at times, not unreasonably, with the world around us, with the Church, or even with ourselves, and feel tempted to indulge in a certain melancholy, lacking in hope, which can lay hold of our hearts (cf. Evangelii Gaudium 83).

Christmas is also accompanied, whether we like it or not, by tears. The Evangelists did not disguise reality to make it more credible or attractive. They did not indulge in words that were comforting but unrelated to reality. For them, Christmas was not a flight to fantasy, a way of hiding from the challenges and injustices of their day. On the contrary, they relate the birth of the Son of God as an event fraught with tragedy and grief. Quoting the prophet Jeremiah, Matthew presents it in the bluntest of terms: “A voice is heard in Ramah, wailing and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children” (2:18). It is the sobbing of mothers bewailing the death of their children in the face of Herod’s tyranny and unbridled thirst for power.

Today too, we hear this heart-rending cry of pain, which we neither desire nor are able to ignore or to silence. In our world – I write this with a heavy heart – we continue to hear the lamentation of so many mothers, of so many families, for the death of their children, their innocent children.

To contemplate the manger also means to contemplate this cry of pain, to open our eyes and ears to what is going on around us, and to let our hearts be attentive and open to the pain of our neighbours, especially where children are involved. It also means realizing that that sad chapter in history is still being written today. To contemplate the manger in isolation from the world around us would make Christmas into a lovely story that inspires warm feelings but robs us of the creative power of the Good News that the Incarnate Word wants to give us. The temptation is real.

Can we truly experience Christian joy if we turn our backs on these realities? Can Christian joy even exist if we ignore the cry of our brothers and sisters, the cry of the children?

Saint Joseph was the first to be charged with protecting the joy of salvation. Faced with the atrocious crimes that were taking place, Saint Joseph – the model of an obedient and loyal man – was capable of recognizing God’s voice and the mission entrusted to him by the Father. Because he was able to hear God’s voice, and was docile to his will, Joseph became more conscious of what was going on around him and was able to interpret these events realistically.

The same thing is asked of us pastors today: to be men attentive, and not deaf, to the voice of God, and hence more sensitive to what is happening all around us. Today, with Saint Joseph as our model, we are asked not to let ourselves be robbed of joy. We are asked to protect this joy from the Herods of our own time. Like Joseph, we need the courage to respond to this reality, to arise and take it firmly in hand (cf. Mt 2:20). The courage to guard this joy from the new Herods of our time, who devour the innocence of our children. An innocence robbed from them by the oppression of illegal slave labour, prostitution and exploitation. An innocence shattered by wars and forced immigration, with the great loss that this entails. Thousands of our children have fallen into the hands of gangs, criminal organizations and merchants of death, who only devour and exploit their neediness.

To illustrate this point, there are at present 75 million children who, due to prolonged situations of emergency and crisis, have had to interrupt their education. In 2015, 68% of all persons who were victims of sexual exploitation were children. At the same time, a third of all children who have to live outside their homelands do so because forcibly displaced. We live in a world where almost half of the children who die under the age of five do so because of malnutrition. It is estimated that in 2016 there were 150 million child labourers, many of whom live in conditions of slavery. According to the most recent report presented by UNICEF, unless the world situation changes, in 2030 there will be 167 million children living in extreme poverty, 69 million children under the age of five will die between 2016 and 2030, and 16 million children will not receive basic schooling.

We hear these children and their cries of pain; we also hear the cry of the Church our Mother, who weeps not only for the pain caused to her youngest sons and daughters, but also because she recognizes the sins of some of her members: the sufferings, the experiences and the pain of minors who were abused sexually by priests. It is a sin that shames us. Persons responsible for the protection of those children destroyed their dignity. We regret this deeply and we beg forgiveness. We join in the pain of the victims and weep for this sin. The sin of what happened, the sin of failing to help, the sin of covering up and denial, the sin of the abuse of power. The Church also weeps bitterly over this sin of her sons and she asks forgiveness. Today, as we commemorate the feast of the Holy Innocents, I would like us to renew our complete commitment to ensuring that these atrocities will no longer take place in our midst. Let us find the courage needed to take all necessary measures and to protect in every way the lives of our children, so that such crimes may never be repeated. In this area, let us adhere, clearly and faithfully, to “zero tolerance”.

Christian joy does not arise on the fringes of reality, by ignoring it or acting as if it did not exist. Christian joy is born from a call – the same call that Saint Joseph received – to embrace and protect human life, especially that of the holy innocents of our own day. Christmas is a time that challenges us to protect life, to help it be born and grow. It is a time that challenges us as bishops to find new courage. The courage that generates processes capable of acknowledging the reality that many of our children are experiencing today, and working to ensure them the bare minimum needed so that their dignity as God’s children will not only be respected but, above all, defended.

Let us not allow them to be robbed of joy. Let us not allow ourselves to be robbed of joy, but guard it and nourish its growth.

May we do this with the paternal fidelity of Saint Joseph and guided by Mary, Mother of tender love, so that our own hearts may never grow hard.

With fraternal affection,

FRANCIS

From the Vatican, 28 December 2016
Feast of the Holy Innocents, Martyrs

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Vatican City, Jan 2, 2017 / 07:49 am (CNA/EWTN News).- In a letter sent to bishops around the world for the feast of the Holy Innocents, Pope Francis lamented the many children who suffer from war, slavery and various forms of abuse, including within the Church.

The Church not only hears the “cries of pain” of her children who suffer from war, slavery and malnutrition, he said, but she also weeps “because she recognizes the sins of some of her members: the sufferings, the experiences and the pain of minors who were abused sexually by priests.”

“It is a sin that shames us. Persons responsible for the protection of those children destroyed their dignity. We regret this deeply and we beg forgiveness.”

Francis condemned the sin “of failing to help,” of “covering up and denial” and the sin of “the abuse of power” that happened in many cases.  

In celebrating the Feast of the Holy Innocents, Pope Francis asked his brother bishops to renew “our complete commitment to ensuring that these atrocities will no longer take place in our midst.”

“Let us find the courage needed to take all necessary measures and to protect in every way the lives of our children, so that such crimes may never be repeated. In this area, let us adhere, clearly and faithfully, to zero tolerance.”

The Pope’s words were spoken in a letter, dated on the Dec. 28 feast commemorating the infants slaughtered by King Herod in his attempt to kill Jesus, and was addressed to bishops around the world.

He has often promoted a “zero tolerance” policy on abuse since his election, and has met with victims of clerical sex abuse and their relatives on several occasions.

During his 2015 visit to the United States, Francis met with a group of abuse victims ahead of his audience with the country’s bishops, during which he issued harsh words on abuse, noting that many children had been “raped” and that covering up the crime was a “sacrilege.”

He has also often praised the great efforts retired Pope Benedict XVI made in dealing with the crisis, saying on his Feb. 18, 2016, return flight from Mexico that his predecessor “deserves applause,” because he “fought in moments when he had no strength to impose himself, until he managed to impose himself.”

As head of the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the then-Cardinal Ratzinger “had everything in his hands. He conducted all the investigations, and went on, went on, went on, until he couldn’t go any further in the execution.”

Francis has also come out as a man of his word when it comes to holding bishops accountable for negligence in abuse cases. Not only did he institute the Commission for the Protection of Minors at the beginning of his pontificate in 2013 as a means of developing guidelines and “best practices” for abuse prevention, but in June 2016 he published a motu proprio titled “Like a Loving Mother” saying negligence on the part of a bishop is enough to oust him from office.

He has also created a Vatican tribunal to prosecute bishops for abuse of office and has so far accepted the resignations of three U.S. bishops accused of mismanaging allegations of abuse: Bishop Robert Finn of Kansas City-St. Joseph and Archbishop John Nienstedt and Auxiliary Bishop Lee A. Piché, both of whom are from St. Paul-Minneapolis.

In his letter to bishops, Pope Francis also noted the many children who suffer and die due to other forms of abuse, saying to contemplate the manger at Christmas also means to “open our eyes and ears to what is going on around us, and to let our hearts be attentive and open to the pain of our neighbors, especially where children are involved.”

Just as St. Joseph was conscious of the events going on around him and was able to interpret them in a realistic way, today’s pastors must also be “men attentive, and not deaf, to the voice of God, and hence more sensitive to what is happening all around us,” Francis said.

“With Saint Joseph as our model, we are asked not to let ourselves be robbed of joy...we need the courage to respond to this reality, to arise and take it firmly in hand. The courage to guard this joy from the new Herods of our time, who devour the innocence of our children.”

This innocence is stolen by scourges such as illegal slave labor, exploitation and prostitution. It is “shattered by wars and forced immigration, with the great loss that this entails,” he said, noting that many children have fallen into gangs or criminal organizations and “merchants of death, who only devour and exploit their neediness.”

He noted that according to statistics, there are currently 75 million children who due to emergency situations and crisis have no education, and that a third of the children who live outside their homelands do so because they have been forcibly displaced.

Pointing to a recent report from UNICEF, the Pope said that unless things change, there will by 167 million children living in “extreme poverty” by 2030, and that 69 million children under the age of five will die between 2016-2030 while 16 million children will not receive a basic education.

Christian joy, he said, “does not arise on the fringes of reality, by ignoring it or acting as if it did not exist.” Rather, it is born from the call to “embrace and protect human life, especially that of the holy innocents of our own day.”

Francis closed saying Christmas is a time that impels us to “protect life” and which challenges bishops in particular to “find new courage” in both acknowledging the reality that many children experience today, and to work to ensure that their dignity as God’s children “will not only be respected but, above all, defended.”

“Let us not allow ourselves to be robbed of joy, but guard it and nourish its growth,” he said, praying they would go forward “with the paternal fidelity of Saint Joseph and guided by Mary, Mother of tender love, so that our own hearts may never grow hard.”

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