“Combating poverty, building peace” is the theme chosen by Benedict XVI for his message for the 42nd World Day of Peace, due to be celebrated on 1 January 2009. In a statement released today, the Vatican said that by choosing the topic of “Combating poverty, building peace,” the Pope wants “to highlight the need for the human family to find an urgent response to the serious question of poverty, seen as a material problem but above all as a moral and spiritual one.”
More recently the Holy Father denounced the scandal of poverty in the world, wondering “how can one remain insensitive to the appeals of those who, on the various continents, are not able to feed themselves enough to live? Poverty and malnutrition are not a simple fatality, provoked by adverse environmental situations or by disastrous natural calamities. . . . Purely technical and economic considerations must not prevail over the duties of justice towards people suffering from hunger (Message addressed by His Holiness Benedict XVI to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation on 2 June).”
“The scandal of poverty reveals the inadequacy of current systems of human coexistence in promoting the realisation of the common good (cf Second Vatican Council, Past Constitution, Gaudium et spes, 69).
“This imposes the need for reflection on the deep roots of material poverty and, consequently, also on spiritual poverty which makes man indifferent to the suffering of others. The answer, then, is to be sought first and foremost in the conversion of the human heart to the God of charity (cf Benedict XVI, Encyclical Letter Deus Carits Est), so as to achieve poverty of spirit in the terms of the Message of salvation announced by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount: ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven’ (cf, Mt 5:3).”
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