03/24/2017, 20.42
VATICAN - EU
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Pope: Europe is not just an economy, but a way of conceiving man and a capacity for hope

Francis spoke to the heads of state and government of the 27 EU member states on the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome. He told them that the Old Continent is a reality based on the centrality of man, effective solidarity, openness to the world, the pursuit of peace and development, and overture to the future. He also talked about "serious migration crisis" and the populism that is the "fruit of an egotism".

Vatican City (AsiaNews) – Pope Francis spoke this afternoon in the Sala Regia of the Apostolic Palace to the heads of state and government of the 27 members of the European Union on the 60th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Rome. European Parliament Speaker Antonio Tajani, European Council President Donald Tusk and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker were also present.

The pontiff told the distinguished leaders that “Europe is not a conglomeration of rules to obey,” but “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,” a reality based on the centrality of man, effective solidarity, openness to the world, the pursuit of peace and development, and overture to the future.

Responding to the greetings of Italian Prime Minister, Paolo Gentiloni, and the European Parliament Speaker Antonio Tajani, the pope noted that 25 March 1957 was "unique in history" for its scope and historical consequences.

In his address, Francis highlighted some of the issues close to his heart, starting with solidarity with those who are forced to migrate to the European Union because of war and poverty European Union.

“The European Union was born as a unity of differences and a unity in differences” that accepts pluralism and rejects populism and nationalism because “When one suffers, all suffer. Today, with the United Kingdom, we mourn the victims of the attack that took place in London two days ago.”

“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’. Rome, with its vocation to universality,] 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’. “

Only man could be at the heart of the European project

“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.”

“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. [. . .] 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’, 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’. 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.”

Sixty years later, in a world economically in crisis, where established social and family models are challenged, “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.” Ours “is a time of challenge and opportunity.

Answers about the future “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, 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 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”.

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.”

“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 hope again when it does not close up

“Europe finds new hope when it refuses to yield to fear or close itself 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’.

Today, “Openness to the world implies the capacity for ‘dialogue as a form of encounter’ 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’, 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.”

The Union today must find the will to work together once again and the desire to bet on the future. “As leaders, you are called to blaze the path of a ‘new European humanism’ 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.”

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