Oren Dorell, USA TODAY
Pope Francis speaks to the United Nations about the importance of protecting the environment.
VPC
Pope Francis called on world leaders gathered at the United Nations
in New York on Friday to take firm action on the environment, blaming a
"selfish and boundless thirst for power and material" for its
destruction.
"We human beings are part of the environment,"
Francis said. "We live in communion with it, since the environment
itself entails ethical limits which human activity must acknowledge and
respect. ... Any harm done to the environment, therefore, is harm done
to humanity."
The speech to the 193-member U.N. General Assembly
expanded on themes Francis has already discussed during his
whirlwind trip to the United States and Cuba. His visit to the United
Nations is the fifth by a pope.
Speaking
in Spanish, Francis greeted the citizens of all the nations represented
in the hall before addressing the global dangers of unlimited power.
The U.N. was created after World War II,
at a moment of history "marked by our technical ability to overcome
distances and frontiers and, apparently, to overcome all natural limits
to the exercise of power," he said. The U.N. was created as a response
to technological power that, "in the hands of nationalistic or falsely
universalist ideologies, is capable of perpetrating tremendous
atrocities," he added.
"The U.N. founding charter is based on the
development and promotion of international law," Francis said. "The
limitation of power is an idea implicit in the concept of law itself.
... No human individual or group can consider itself absolute, permitted
to bypass the dignity and the rights of other individuals or their
social groupings."
On the environment, Francis said Christians and
other religions believe man is supposed to take care of nature. "He is
not authorized to abuse it, much less to destroy it."
Environmental
destruction goes hand-in-hand with injustice, and is a result of a
system that is too focused on material wealth, Francis said.
"A
selfish and boundless thirst for power and material prosperity" that
misuses natural resources and degrades the environment also leads to
social ills by excluding those who are physically, economically or
politically weak, he said. "Economic and social exclusion is a complete
denial of human fraternity and a grave offense against human rights and
the environment."
Francis also discussed the need to address other
"scourges" of the world. He called for the elimination of nuclear
weapons and urged world leaders to work "toward the complete prohibition
of these weapons." He praised the Iran nuclear deal reached through
diplomacy, and said he hopes it will last, "with the cooperation of all
the parties involved."
No comments:
Post a Comment