Global economy should be on a moral footing
Put the reeling global economy on a moral footing and give more financial trust to the less well-off and their faith-based allies, the Vatican's U.N. representative says.
"Finance is not a game," Archbishop Celestino Migliore told Catholic San Francisco in a Dec. 22 interview. "Among some big and wealthy people, they just play finances as a game. Really finance works as long as it's put in the service of the common good and especially the great slice of our society which is composed of poor people or people who are not rich."
Rich nations must not respond to today's crisis by retrenching to protectionism but must play an ever-stronger role in global development, Archbishop Migliore said. Recounting his address to the U.S.-sponsored meeting on international development in Doha, Qatar, earlier in December, he said stronger nations must continue their aid commitments in order to support some 40 countries that are too weak to manage on their own.
The archbishop, who serves as Titular Archbishiop of Canosa, Apostolic Nuncio and Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations, echoed Pope Benedict XVI's prepared message for the World Day of Peace, to be marked Jan. 1.
The Holy Father said the role of finance in supporting long-term investment and therefore development appears "extremely fragile." He said the crisis demonstrates "how financial activity can at times be completely turned on itself, lacking any long-term consideration of the common good."
Archbishop Migliore, who was in the San Francisco area to give a lecture at an Advent program sponsored by St. Rita Parish in Fairfax, said the Vatican's prescription for a sustainable and just global economy also includes such measures as small-scale business and farm loans to the poor. One lesson of the economic crisis, he said, is that the poor turn out to be among the best debtors because they repay their debts.
Other measures to put more economic trust in the hands of the less well-off include taxation by resource-rich developing nations on their economic output and greater trust and cooperation between governments and non-governmental organizations, especially faith-based groups, he said.
Taxation would provide the means for developing nations to fund their own growth instead of relying on outside aid, the archbishop said. Greater trust in the groups who work closest with those in need would result in better services at a better price because it would cut down on the "terrible bureaucratization" that can eat up more than half of donors' money, he said.
The Vatican's role in international development is humanitarian rather than political and is centered on people working in the field, he said. These faith-based workers not only cost less, the Archbishop said, but "they live with the population and I would say in many cases they perform miracles."
The Vatican diplomat also called for greater cooperation between well-funded aid groups and the Church despite ideological differences over such issues as homosexuality and condom use.
He said the leader of one aid group working on the HIV/AIDS crisis, noticing his clerical collar, expressed frustration over working with the Church. The aid chief said, "'With you guys it's impossible, we'll never agree. You're obsessed with gays and condoms we'll never solve the problem."'
The archbishop recalled his reply: "Why don't we join forces and try to respect each other and respect our programs because they do work and they do deliver. So you just respect them and we will never send you to hell."
In the interview, the diplomat also clarified the Vatican's role in December's debate in the U.N. General Assembly on a proposed statement calling for the decriminalization of homosexuality. Press criticism of the Church's opposition to the proposal was misguided, he said.
"From the very beginning we said we would be most happy to have a declaration much stronger and much clearer on decriminalization because there are still too many countries that really commit many forms of violence against homosexuals just because they are homosexuals," he said. "So on decriminalization the Church never had the slightest problem. We are against violence -- all forms of violence and unjust discrimination against homosexuals.
But only three of the 13 points in the European-drafted statement on gay rights concerned decriminalization, the archbishop said.
"The text goes much beyond that," he said. "It speaks of two categories -- sexual orientation and gender identity -- that are not unequivocally defined in international law, are not recognized yet in international law. So if we use those two categories, we dilute the issue of decriminalization and we go against other rights, because this will infringe on the right of marriage, because this will put on an equal footing same-sex unions and marriage.
"Once you have to proclaim rights to implement them this will be at the whim of the legislature or judicial system," he said. "It will create a great uncertainty and will cause problems for those who are not ready to reinterpret the notion of family and marriage."
Archbishop Migliore said these concerns resulted in a three-way split in the 192-nation General Assembly when the proposal was put up for a vote Dec. 19. Sixty-six backed the European proposal, 58 supported a counter-resolution and 68, including the United States, formed a "silent majority" favoring a clearer, more strongly worded statement for the decriminalization of homosexuality.
Press criticism of the Vatican's role in the debate was a "great injustice," Archbishop Migliore said.
"The Holy See is for decriminalization but it is not for an expansion of rights that would create new problems," he said.
(By Rick DelVecchio)
From the January 9, 2009 issue of Catholic San Francisco
