Archbishop Gallagher read Pope Francis’ letter at a meeting of the UN Security Council. Peace is possible, the pope said, if there is the will. The Security Council should implement the “United Nations Charter” and have no other purpose.
(Vatican News Network) Pope Francis sent a letter to those attending the UN Security Council meeting in New York on June 14, pointing out that “now is the time to seriously say ‘no’ to war, and at the same time affirm that war is not just, only peace is just” . The theme of the meeting was “The Value of Human Fraternity in Promoting and Implementing Peace”. United Nations Secretary-General Guterres, Azhar Grand Imam Tayyib and other dignitaries attended the meeting. The Pope’s letter was read by Archbishop Gallagher, Secretary General of the Vatican’s Department of Relations with States and International Organizations.
In the letter, the Pope first analyzed the “critical moment” that mankind is going through, noting that “at this moment, peace seems to succumb to war”. Humanity “has once again turned back in history, with the rise of narrow, radical, resentful and aggressive nationalisms, and the wars they have sparked are not only outdated, but outdated, and more violent.” “Conflicts are increasing, stability is increasingly threatened. We are in a third world war that is piecemeal, and the longer it goes on, the wider the scope will be.”
Taking this opportunity, the Pope also spoke about the mission of the Security Council, expecting this institution to implement the Charter of the United Nations in a transparent and sincere manner, with no other purpose; to use it as a judicially enforced point of reference, not as a document that conceals ambiguous intentions . “In today’s globalized world, we are closer to each other, but this does not mean more brotherhood. On the contrary, we suffer from a famine of brotherhood, born of many injustices, poverty and Inequalities, and the lack of a culture of solidarity.”
The pope said that as a “man of faith”, he firmly believes that peace is “God’s dream for mankind”. However, “because of the war, this wonderful dream is turning into a nightmare”. The Pope acknowledged that the root of the problem is also related to the economy. “War is often more attractive than peace because it is profitable, but it always benefits the few to the detriment of the well-being of the many; therefore the money earned by the arms trade is stained with the blood of the innocent” .
In order to build peace, the Pope insisted, “we must move beyond the logic of the legitimacy of war” and that if armed conflicts were limited in the past, “today, with nuclear weapons and weapons of mass destruction, the battlefield becomes practically unlimited. , with catastrophic potential effects”. The Pope reiterated that it is necessary to say “no” seriously to war and “yes” to a stable and lasting peace, not based on a dangerous balance of deterrence, but on the brotherhood that unites us.
Not all is lost, the Pope concluded, “We still have time to write a new chapter in history. We can make wars belong to the past and not to the future”. “Brotherhood” is a defining word, it “is not an abstract concept that must become a concrete starting point”.
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