By Hazel Henderson
ST. AUGUSTINE, Florida, Aug 27 2015 (IPS)

Millions in the New York City area are excited about Pope Francis’ visit on Sep. 25 to address the U.N. General Assembly as worldwide consensus grows on the need to shift global investments from fossil fuels to clean, efficient, renewable energy in the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) scheduled to replace the expiring Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). 

Private investments worldwide in the clean energy transition now total 6.22 trillion dollars while successful U.S. students’ divestment networks have forced over 30 college endowments to divest.  Over 200 institutions have divested worldwide, including the U.S. cities of Minneapolis and Seattle, Oxford in the United Kingdom and Dunedin in New Zealand.

Hazel Henderson

The Episcopal Church and the Church of England, in a faith-based consortium, are calling on Pope Francis to urge divestment for all religious and civic groups.  Islamic Climate Change Symposium leaders cited the Quran earlier this month in calling 1.6 billion Muslims to act in phasing out fossil fuels by 2050.

Backlash from traditional Wall Streeters has joined some U.S. Catholic organisations with millions still invested in fossil energy, fracking and oil sands.  The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has guidelines against investing in abortion, contraception, pornography, tobacco and war but is silent on energy stocks.

Reuters reports that Catholic dioceses in Boston, Baltimore, Toledo and much of Minnesota in the United States have millions of dollars in oil and gas stocks, making up between 5-10 percent of their holdings.  It has been reported that Chicago’s Archbishop Blasé Cupich, appointed by Pope Francis, will re-examine over 100 million dollars in fossil fuel investments.

Wall Street is also re-examining its positions on fossil fuels.  A survey of asset managers in Institutional Investor, July 2015, found that 77 percent expected the carbon-divestiture movement to continue and gain momentum.  Yet, Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson has claimed that the models on climate change “aren’t that good” and has no plans to invest in renewable energy.

Recently, many large companies have been calling for and budgeting for carbon pricing – favoured by most economists.  Britain’s BG Group, BP, Italy’s ENI, Shell, Norway’s Statoil and France’s Total sent an open letter to world governments and the United Nations in June asking them to accelerate carbon pricing schemes.The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has guidelines against investing in abortion, contraception, pornography, tobacco and war but is silent on energy stocks

The ethical investing movement now accounts for one-sixth of all holdings on Wall Street and the U.N. Principles of Responsible Investing counts signatory institutions with 59 trillion dollars in assets under management.

Hybrid approaches include venture philanthropy and “impact” investing, while a recent CFA Institute survey found almost three quarters of investment professionals use environmental, social and governance information in their investment decisions.

Against this backdrop, Timothy Smith, pioneer founder of the Interfaith Council on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR) and now Senior Vice-President of Walden Asset Management, says that the “visit of the Pope in the wake of his prophetic Encyclical on climate is a clarion call – to ramp up our efforts to combat climate change with concrete actions,” adding that “it’s not the Pope’s job to present a specific game plan for Americans.  That is our job.”

Through ICCR, religious investors have worked for two decades on these issues.  Firms like Walden, Ceres and others have joined up to combat climate change, promoting efficiency and renewable resources.  All this new activity within the climate debate provides the greatest challenge yet to business-as-usual capitalism.

Many financiers in the global casino still see themselves as “masters of the universe” because they control capital flows, most investments, pension funds, influence monetary policies, capture politicians and regulators, while funding friendly academics and think tanks.

The recent jitters of stock markets have again revealed their fragility and the increasing turbulence and volatility caused by computerized algorithms accounting for over half of all activity.  High-frequency trading (HFT), “flash crashes”, are continuing with little regulation.  Foundations are crumbling from these many new challenges as small investors flee. 

Crowdfunding, peer-to-peer lending, local and cryptocurrencies, credit unions and cooperative enterprises are flowering along with hybrid start-ups in the “shareconomy” – AirBnB, Uber, Lyft, Task Rabbit and the growth of farmers markets, swap sites for tools, clothes and second-hand exchanges.

Many reformers of capitalism try to change its culture, of short term gain and speculative trading.  The U.N. Inquiry into the Design of a Sustainable Financial System will release its report to the General Assembly on Sep. 25, with global research on current practices and potential reforms.

A promising new effort to mobilise U.S. public opinion is JUSTCapital, founded by luminaries Deepak Chopra, Arianna Huffington and hedge fund philanthropist Paul Tudor Jones.  CEO Martin Whittaker says: “We are addressing some of the core questions affecting capitalism and corporations in the 21^st century.  We are applying policy, research and surveys to define ‘just business behaviour’ in the eye of the public, using this definition to evaluate and rank the performance of the largest publicly traded American companies.”

While such caring financiers are quietly exploring reforms, the biggest threat is the fragility of global market structures from automation, algorithms, HFT and artificial intelligence which financiers still believe they can control.

Yet these same computers can now run markets more efficiently than humans.  Matching and trading buy and sell orders in transparent computerised black boxes makes human traders redundant, as well as reducing insider trading, speculating, front-running, naked short-selling, fixing interest rates and today’s widespread greed and corruption.

Capitalism’s greatest challenge is its reliance on rollercoaster national money systems and currencies.  Central bankers and governments’ tools fail along with economic theories as social movements are now aware of money-printing and the politics of money creation and credit-allocation, revealed in all its favouritism and inequalities.

Edited by Phil Harris   

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

There is no papal bull on transgenic crops in Laudato Si, the second encyclical of Pope Francis, “on the care of our common home” – planet earth. Credit: Norberto Miguel/IPS

By Emilio Godoy
MEXICO CITY, Aug 11 2015 (IPS)

A few centuries ago, the biotechnology industry would have been able to buy a papal bull to expiate its sins and grant it redemption. But in his encyclical on the environment, “Laudato Si”, Pope Francis condemns genetically modified organisms (GMOs) without leaving room for a pardon.

In his second encyclical since he became pope on Mar. 13, 2013 – but the first that is entirely his work – Jorge Mario Bergoglio criticises the social, economic and agricultural impacts of GMOs and calls for a broad scientific debate.

Laudato Si – “Praise be to you, my Lord” in medieval Italian – takes its title from Saint Francis of Assisi’s 13th-century Canticle of the Sun, one of whose verses is: “Be praised, my Lord, through our sister Mother Earth, who feeds us and rules us, and produces various fruits with colored flowers and herbs.”

It is the first encyclical in history dedicated to the environment and reflecting on “our common home” – planet earth.“In many places, following the introduction of these crops, productive land is concentrated in the hands of a few owners due to ‘the progressive disappearance of small producers, who, as a consequence of the loss of the exploited lands, are obliged to withdraw from direct production’.” – Laudato Si

The encyclical, which was published Jun. 18, acknowledges that “no conclusive proof exists that GM cereals may be harmful to human beings.” But it stresses that “there remain a number of significant difficulties which should not be underestimated.”

“In many places, following the introduction of these crops, productive land is concentrated in the hands of a few owners due to ‘the progressive disappearance of small producers, who, as a consequence of the loss of the exploited lands, are obliged to withdraw from direct production’,” it adds.

As a result, says the first Latin American pope, farmers are driven to become temporary labourers, many rural workers end up in urban slums, ecosystems are destroyed, and “oligopolies” expand in the production of cereals and inputs needed for their cultivation.

Francis calls for “A broad, responsible scientific and social debate…one capable of considering all the available information and of calling things by their name” because “It sometimes happens that complete information is not put on the table; a selection is made on the basis of particular interests, be they politico-economic or ideological.”

Such a debate on GMOs is missing, and the biotech industry has refused to open up its databases to verify whether or not transgenic crops are innocuous.

According to the encyclical, “Discussions are needed in which all those directly or indirectly affected (farmers, consumers, civil authorities, scientists, seed producers, people living near fumigated fields, and others) can make known their problems and concerns, and have access to adequate and reliable information in order to make decisions for the common good, present and future.”

Miguel Concha, a Catholic priest who heads the Fray Francisco de Vitoria Human Rights Centre in Mexico, said this country “is already a reference point in the fight for the right to a healthy environment, due to the determined efforts of social organisations. This encyclical reinforces our collective demand,” he told Tierramérica.

The priest said the encyclical warns of the social, economic, legal and ethical implications of transgenic crops, just as environmentalists in Mexico have done for years.

In a local market in Mexico, María Solís shows the different colours of native maize that she grows. Native crops are threatened by attempts to introduce large-scale commercial planting of GM maize in the country. Credit: Emilio Godoy/IPS

The document holds special importance for nations like Mexico, which have been the scene of intense battles over transgenic crops – in this country mainly maize, which has special cultural significance here, besides being the basis of the local diet.

That is also true for Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica, which together with southern Mexico form Mesoamérica, the seat of the ancient Maya civilisation.

The pope is familiar with the impact of transgenic crops, because according to experts his home country, Argentina, is the Latin American nation where GMOs have done the most to alter traditional agriculture.

Soy – 98 percent of which is transgenic – is Argentina’s leading crop, covering 31 million hectares, up from just 4.8 million hectares in 1990, according to the soy industry association, ACSOJA.

The monoculture crop has displaced local producers, fuelled the concentration of land, and created “a vicious circle that is highly dangerous for the sustainability of our production systems,” Argentine agronomist Carlos Toledo told Tierramérica.

Just 10 countries account for nearly all production of GMOs: the United States, Brazil, Argentina, Canada, India, China, Paraguay, South Africa, Pakistan and Uruguay, in that order. Most of the production goes to the animal feed industry, but Mexico wants GM maize to be used for human consumption.

In July 2013, 53 individuals and 20 civil society organisations mounted a collective legal challenge against applications to commercially plant transgenic maize, and in September of that year a federal judge granted a precautionary ban on such authorisations.

Since March 2014, organisations of beekeepers and indigenous communities have won two further provisional protection orders against commercial transgenic soybean crops in the southeastern states of Campeche and Yucatán.

On Apr. 30, 2014, eight scientists from six countries sent an open letter to Pope Francis about the negative environmental, economic, agricultural, cultural and social impacts of GM seeds, especially in Mexico.

In their letter, the experts stated: “…we believe that it would be of momentous importance and great value to all if Your Holiness were to express yourself critically on GM crops and in support of peasant farming. This support would go a long way toward saving peoples and the planet from the threat posed by the control of life wielded by companies that monopolise seeds, which are the key to the entire food web…”

Laudato Si indicates that the pope did listen to their plea.

“The encyclical is very encouraging, because it has expressed an ecological position,” Argelia Arriaga, a professor at the University Centre for Disaster Prevention of the Autonomous University of Puebla, told Tierramérica. “It touches sensitive fibers; the situation is terrible and merits papal intervention. This gives us moral support to continue the struggle.”

But legal action has failed to curb the biotech industry’s ambitions in Mexico.

In 2014, the National Service for Agri-Food Health, Safety and Quality (SENASICA) received four applications from the biotech industry and public research centres for experimental planting of maize on nearly 10 hectares of land.

In addition, there were 30 requests for pilot projects involving experimental and commercial planting of GM cotton on a total of 1.18 million hectares – as well as one application for beans, five for wheat, three for lemons and one for soy – all experimental.

SENASICA is also processing five biotech industry requests for planting more than 200,000 hectares of GM cotton and alfalfa for commercial and experimental purposes.

“This is an economic and development model that ignores food production,” said Concha, the priest who heads the Fray Francisco de Vitoria Human Rights Centre.

The participants in the collective lawsuit against GMOs, having successfully gotten federal courts to throw out 22 stays brought by the government and companies against the legal decision to temporarily suspend permits for planting, are now getting ready for a trial that will decide the future of transgenic crops in the country.

Arriaga noted that the focus of the encyclical goes beyond GM crops, and extends to other environmental struggles. “For people in local communities, the pope’s message is important, because it tells them they have to take care of nature and natural resources. It helps raise awareness,” the professor said.

This story was originally published by Latin American newspapers that are part of the Tierramérica network.

Edited by Estrella Gutiérrez/Translated by Stephanie Wildes

Patricia Gualinga (right), a representative of the Serayaku community in the Amazonic part of Ecuador, told the Summit of Conscience for the Climate in Paris: “We’re here because we want the voices of indigenous people to be heard”. Credit: A.D. McKenzie/IPS

By A. D. McKenzie
PARIS, Jul 24 2015 (IPS)

“We received a garden as our home, and we must not turn it into a wilderness for our children.”

These words by Cardinal Peter Turkson summed up the appeal launched by dozens of religious leaders and “moral” thinkers at the Summit of Conscience for the Climate, a one-day gathering in Paris earlier this week aimed at mobilising action ahead of the next United Nations climate change conference (COP 21) scheduled to take place in the French capital in just over four months.

“The single biggest obstacle to changing course [over climate change] is our minds and hearts” – Cardinal Peter Turkson, an adviser for Pope Francis’ encyclical on climate change
“Our prayerful wish is that governments will be as committed at COP 21 as we are here,” said Turkson, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace and one of the advisers for Pope Francis’ encyclical on climate change, released in June.

With the theme of “Why Do I Care”, the Summit of Conscience drew participants from around the globe, representing the world’s major religions – Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam and Judaism – and other faiths and movements.

Government representatives also joined activists from environmental groups, indigenous communities and the arts sector to call for an end to the world’s “throw-away consumerist culture” and the “disastrous indifference to the environment”, as Turkson put it.

“The single biggest obstacle to changing course is our minds and hearts,” he said, after pointing out that “climate change is being borne by those who have contributed least to it”.

The summit was used to highlight an international “Call to Conscience for the climate” and to launch a new organisation called ‘Green Faith in Action’, aimed at raising awareness about environmental and sustainable development issues among adherents of different religions.

Participants drew up a letter that will be delivered to the 195 state parties at COP 21, signed by summit speakers including Prince Albert II of Monaco; Sheikh Khaled Bentounès, Sufi Master of the Alawiya in Algeria; Rajwant Singh, director of an international network called Eco Sikh; and Nigel Savage, president of the Jewish environmental organisation Hazon.

Voicing the concerns of religious groups and faith leaders, the letter is equally a reflection of the challenges faced by indigenous communities, who made their voices heard in Paris, describing attacks on their territories and way of life by the petroleum industry, for example.

“We’re not some kind of folkloric tradition, we’re living beings,” said Valdelice Veron, spokesperson of the Guarani-Kaoiwa people of Brazil, who delivered her speech in traditional dress.

She and other indigenous delegates spoke of their culture also being decimated by the practice of mono-cropping, where large soybean plantations are causing ecological damage.

“We’re here because we want the voices of indigenous people to be heard,” Patricia Gualinga, a representative of the Serayaku community in the Amazonic part of Ecuador, told IPS.

“We share all the concerns about the climate and we too are being affected in many different ways,” she said.

Ségolène Royal, the French Minister for Ecology, Sustainable Development and Energy who spoke near the end of the summit, said the participants’ appeal was “first and foremost, an appeal for action”.

“Climate change should be considered as an opportunity – for business, technology, [and other sectors],” Royal said. “We need to pave the way together.”

Three participants at the Summit of Conscience for the Climate stand together for a photo. Credit: A.D. McKenzie/IPS

For Samantha Smith, leader of the “Global Climate and Energy Initiative” at green group WWF, the Summit of Conscience reflected a “really big and unprecedented social mobilisation” of civil society, which she hopes will continue beyond COP 21.

“When I read the latest climate science report, it keeps me awake at night. But when I see the mobilisation and the strength of the conviction, I’m optimistic,” Smith said in an interview on the sidelines of the summit.

“Now is not the time to focus on where we disagree. Now is the time to work together,” she added.

But not everyone is invited to the same table – the alliances do not necessarily extend to companies in the fossil fuel industry, said Smith.

“When I say that we need to be united, it doesn’t mean that we need to be united with the fossil fuel industry,” Smith told IPS. “That is an industry which has contributed vastly to the problem and so far is not showing a very substantial contribution to the solution.”

The business sector, including oil producers, held their own conference in May, titled the Business & Climate Summit. At that event, which also took place in Paris, around 2,000 representatives of some of the world’s largest companies declared that they wanted “a global climate deal that achieves net zero emissions” and that they wished to see this achieved at COP 21.

Then at the beginning of July, hundreds of local authority representatives, civil society members and other “non-state actors” took part in the World Summit on Climate & Territories in Lyon, France.

There, participants pledged to take on the “challenge” of keeping global temperatures below a 2 degree Celsius increase “by aligning their daily local and regional actions with the decarbonisation of the world economy scenario”.

The scientific community also held their meeting on climate this month at the Paris headquarters of the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO).

At most of these conferences, French president François Hollande has been a keynote speaker, reiterating his message that the stakes are high and that governments need to show commitment to reach a legally binding, global accord at COP 21, which will take place from Nov. 30 to Dec. 11.

“We need everyone’s commitment to reach this accord,” Hollande said at the Summit of Conscience. “We need the heads of state and government … local actors, businesses. But we also need the citizens of the world.”

Even as he delivered his speech, another conference on the climate was taking place – at the Vatican, with the mayors of about 60 cities meeting with Pope Francis to formulate a pledge on combating greenhouse gas emissions.

Mayors from around the world will meet again, in Paris during COP 21, through an initiative organised by the Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo, and by Michael Bloomberg, U.N. Special Envoy for Cities and Climate Change and former mayor of New York. Billed as the Climate Summit for Local Leaders, this meeting will be held Dec. 4 and should bring together 1,000 mayors.

A question that some observers have been asking, however, is how does one cut through all the grandiose and repetitive speeches at these incessant “summits” and get to real, sustainable action?

Nicolas Hulot, the “Special Envoy of the French President for the Protection of the Planet” and the main organiser of the Summit of Conscience, said he has faced similar queries.

“I’ve been asked ‘what is this going to be useful for’,” he said. “But a light has emerged today, and I hope it will light us up.”

Hulot sought to encourage indigenous groups and others who had travelled from South America, Africa and other regions to Paris for the event, promising them continued support.

“Don’t you doubt the fact that we’re all involved, and we’ll never give in to despair,” he said. “We want to make sure that everybody hears your message because we heard it.”

Edited by Phil Harris

The writer can be followed on Twitter: @mckenzie_ale

A diverse coalition of 24 leading British scientific institutions has issued a communique urging strong and immediate government action at the U.N. climate change conference set for Paris in December.

Nicholas Stern, a former chief economist of the World Bank and president of the British Academy, has called for a strong international climate agreement in Paris this year. Credit: public domain

The statement, issued Tuesday, points to overwhelming evidence that if humanity is to have a reasonable chance of limiting global warming to two degrees C, the world economy must transition to zero-carbon by early in the second half of the century.

Climate economist Lord Nicholas Stern, president of the British Academy, one of the signers, said it “demonstrates the strength of the agreement among the UK’s research institutions about the risks created by rising levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

“Our research community has for many decades been at the forefront of efforts to expand our understanding and knowledge of the causes and potential consequences of climate change,” he said.

“While some of our politicians and newspapers continue to embrace irrational and reckless denial of the risks of climate change, the UK’s leading research institutions are united in recognising the unequivocal evidence that human activities are driving climate change.”

Other signatories include the British Ecological Society, the Institute of Physics, the Royal Astronomical Society, the Royal Meteorological Society and the Wellcome Trust.

The letter notes that the dangers are hardly theoretical, and in fact, many systems are already at risk. A two-degree rise would bring ever more extreme weather, placing entire ecosystems and cultures in harm’s way.

At or above 4 degrees, it notes, the world faces substantial species extinction, global and regional food insecurity, and fundamental changes to human activities that today are taken for granted.

It also stresses that addressing the problem has vast potential for innovation, for example in low-carbon technologies.

Climate mitigation and adaptation actions, including food, energy and water security, air quality, health improvements, and safeguarding the services that ecosystems provide, would bring considerable economic benefits.

Also on Tuesday, the Vatican hosted mayors and governors from major world cities who signed a declaration urging global leaders to take bold action at the U.N. summit.

Mayors from South America, Africa, the United States, Europe and Asia signed a declaration stating that the Paris summit “may be the last effective opportunity to negotiate arrangements that keep human-induced warming below 2 degrees centigrade.”

Leaders should come to a “bold agreement that confines global warming to a limit safe for humanity while protecting the poor and the vulnerable,” said the declaration, which Pope Francis, who has taken a strong public stand on climate change, also signed.

California Governor Jerry Brown, who is in Rome this week, skewered climate change deniers in an interview with the Sacramento Bee, calling them “troglodytes.”

“Because the other side, the Koch brothers, are not sitting still,” Brown said. “They’re raising money, they’re supporting candidates, they’re putting money into think tanks, and denial, doubt and skepticism is being spewed through various media channels, and therefore the sincerity and the authority of the pope is a welcome antidote to that rather virulent strain of climate change denial.”

According to research by Greenpeace, Charles and David Koch (who also funded the right-wing U.S. Tea Party) have sent at least 79,048,951 dollars to groups denying climate change science since 1997.

“We don’t even know how far we’ve gone, or if we’ve gone over the edge,” Brown said in a speech at the Vatican climate summit. “There are tipping points, feedback loops, this is not some linear set of problems that we can predict.

“We have to take measures against an uncertain future which may well be something no one ever wants. We are talking about extinction. We are talking about climate regimes that have not been seen for tens of millions of years. We’re not there yet, but we’re on our way.”

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

March by people of faith, civil society groups and communities impacted by climate change in Rome on Jun. 28 to express gratitude to Pope Francis for the release of his Laudato Si encyclical on the environment. Photo credit: Hoda Baraka/350.org

By Sean Buchanan
ROME, Jun 28 2015 (IPS)

People of faith, civil society groups, and communities affected by climate change marched together in Rome Sunday Jun. 28 to express gratitude to Pope Francis for the release of his Laudato Si encyclical on the environment, and call for bolder climate action by world leaders.

Under the banner of ‘One Earth One Family’, the march brought together Catholics and other Christians, followers of non-Christian faiths, environmentalists and people of goodwill. The march ended in St. Peter’s Square in time for the Pope’s weekly Angelus and blessing.“The truth of the matter is that all of humanity needs to stand united in addressing the crisis of our times. Climate change is an issue for everyone with a moral conscience” – Arianne Kassman, climate activist from Papua New Guinea

The celebratory march was animated by a musical band, a climate choir and colourful public artwork designed by artists from Italy and other countries, whose work played a major role in the People’s Climate March in New York City in September last year.

“As we stand at this critical juncture in addressing the climate crisis, we are particularly grateful to the Pope for releasing this encyclical as an awakening for the world to understand how climate change impacts people across all regions,” said Arianne Kassman, a climate activist from Papua New Guinea who took part in march to speak about the reality of climate change in the Pacific.

“The truth of the matter is that all of humanity needs to stand united in addressing the crisis of our times. Climate change is an issue for everyone with a moral conscience,” she added.

Among the messages relayed to the Pope during the march was a request to make fossil fuel divestment part of his moral message in the urgent need to address the climate crisis.

“The fossil fuel divestment campaign is hinged on the same moral premise communicated by Pope Francis in his encyclical,” said Father Edwin Gariguez, Executive Secretary of Caritas Philippines.

“The campaign serves to highlight the immorality of investing in the source of the climate injustice we currently experience. This is why we hope that moving forward and building on this powerful message, Pope Francis can make fossil fuel divestment a part of his moral argument for urgent climate action.”

A petition urging Pope Francis to rid the Vatican of investments in fossil fuels has already gathered tens of thousands of signatures.

Over recent months, dozens of religious institutions have divested from coal, oil and gas companies or endorsed the effort, including the World Council of Churches, representing half a billion Christians in 150 countries.

In May 2015, the Church of England announced it had sold 12 million pounds in thermal coal and tar sands and just this week the Lutheran World Federation (LWF) announced that it will exclude fossil fuel companies from its investments and call on its member churches with 72 million members to do likewise.

More than 220 institutions have commitments to divest from fossil fuels, with faith institutions making up the biggest segment.

As world leaders prepare to meet in Paris later this year for U.N. climate talks, the growing divestment movement will continue to fuel the ethical and economic revolution needed to prevent catastrophic climate change and growing inequality, a key message from Pope Francis’ encyclical.

“The clear path required to address the climate crisis is one that breaks humanity free from the current stranglehold of fossil fuels on our lives and the planet,” said Hoda Baraka, Global Communications Manager for 350.org, one of the organisers of the march.

“This encyclical reinforces the tectonic shift that is happening – we simply cannot continue to treat the Earth as a tool for exploitation.”

Edited by Phil Harris    

Pope Francis, wearing a yellow raincoat, celebrates mass amidst heavy rains and strong winds near the Tacloban Airport Saturday, January 17, 2015. After the mass, the Pope visited Palo, Leyte to meet with families of typhoon Yolanda victims. The Pope's visit to Leyte was shortened due to an ongoing typhoon in the area. Credit: Malacanang Photo Bureau/public domain

By Tomás Insua
BOSTON, Jun 22 2015 (IPS)

On June 18, Pope Francis issued Laudato Si, the first ever encyclical about ecology, which promises to be a highly influential document for years to come. The encyclical, which is the most authoritative teaching document a Pope can issue, delivered a strong message addressing the moral dimension of the severe ecological crisis we have caused with our “throwaway culture” and general disregard for our common home, the Earth.

One of the most important points of this document is that it connects the dots between social justice and environmental justice. As a parishioner from Buenos Aires I have seen firsthand how Jorge Bergoglio cared deeply about both issues, and it is beautiful to see how he is bringing them together in this historical encyclical.Climate change is a moral issue, so the exasperating lack of ambition of our political leaders in the climate negotiations raises the urgency of mass civic mobilisation this year.

The most prominent example of this connection is how our role in causing climate change is hurting those who had nothing to do with this crisis, namely the poor and future generations.

Although the encyclical will have an impact on Catholic teaching for generations to come, its timing at this particular juncture is no accident. As the Pope himself stated, “the important thing is that there be a bit of time between the issuing of the encyclical and the meeting in Paris, so that it can make a contribution.”

The Paris meeting he referred to is the crucial COP21 summit that the United Nations will convene in December, where the world’s governments are expected to sign a new treaty to tackle human-made climate change and avoid its worst impacts.

This is significant because the international climate negotiations have been characterized by a consistent lack of ambition during the past two decades, allowing the climate change crisis to exacerbate. Greenhouse gases emissions have grown 60 percent since world leaders first met in the Rio Earth Summit of 1992, and continue to accelerate setting the foundation for a severe disruption of the climate system.

Scientists are shouting at us, urging humankind to change course immediately, but we are not listening. That is why strong moral voices such as the one of Pope Francis have the potential to change people’s hearts and overcome the current gridlock.

Climate change is a moral issue, so the exasperating lack of ambition of our political leaders in the climate negotiations raises the urgency of mass civic mobilisation this year. Faced with the clear and present threat of climate change, governments have long used the supposed passivity of their citizens as an excuse for inaction.

The climate movement is growing fast and is building up pressure at an increasing scale, but its growth rate needs to be boosted to meet the size of the challenge. Pope Francis’ encyclical has the potential to draw a huge amount of people to the climate movement by inspiring the world’s 1.2 billion Catholics, as well as non-Catholics who are open to his message, to mobilise in this important year.

Catholics are already responding to the Holy Father’s call by scaling their mobilisation, mainly through the recently founded Global Catholic Climate Movement. This is a coalition of over 100 Catholic organizations from all continents, aiming to raise awareness about the moral imperative of climate change and to amplify the encyclical’s message in the global climate debate by mobilising the Church’s grassroots.

The flagship campaign of the movement is its recently launched Catholic Climate Petition, which the Pope himself endorsed a month ago when we met him in the Vatican, with the goal of collecting at least one million signatures for world leaders gathered in the COP21 summit in Paris. The ask, to be delivered in coalition with other faith and secular organisations, is for governments to take bold action and keep the global temperature increase below the dangerous threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius, relative to pre-industrial levels.

At the same time, people of all faiths are coming together with a strong moral call for action through initiatives such as Fast for the Climate – whereby participants fast on a monthly basis to show solidarity with the victims of climate change – and the People’s Pilgrimage – a series of pilgrimages in the name of climate change led by Yeb Saño, former Philippine climate ambassador, and designed to culminate in a descent on Paris around COP21.

Leaders of other faiths will furthermore join their Catholic counterparts in celebration of the encyclical on June 28, when the interfaith march “One Earth, One Human Family” will go to St. Peter’s Square as a sign of gratitude to Pope Francis.

Whatever happens, this year will go down in the history books. Be sure of that. The Pope has made a massive contribution to making sure it’s remembered for all the right reasons. Now it’s our turn to step up and finish the job.

Edited by Kitty Stapp

Excerpt:

His Holiness Pope Francis departs Malacañan Palace aboard a Pope Mobile after the Welcome Ceremony for the State Visit and Apostolic Journey to the Republic of the Philippines on January 16, 2015. Credit: Malacañang Photo Bureau/public domain

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Jun 18 2015 (IPS)

Judging by his recent public pronouncements – including on reproductive health, biodiversity, the creation of a Palestinian state, the political legitimacy of Cuba and now climate change – Pope Francis may upstage more than 150 world leaders when he addresses the United Nations, come September.

“The Pope will most likely be the headline-grabber,” predicts one longtime U.N. watcher, “particularly if he continues to be as outspoken as he has been so far.”“The failure of global summits on the environment make it plain that our politics are subject to technology and finance.” -- Pope Francis

As his mostly socio-political statements become increasingly hard-hitting, the Argentine-born Il Papa, the first Pope from the developing world, is drawing both ardent supporters and hostile critics.

Last January, during a trip to Asia, he dropped a bombshell when he said Catholics should practice responsible parenthood and stop “breeding like rabbits.”

In the United States, the Pope has been criticised by right-wing conservatives for playing a key behind-the-scenes role in the resumption of U.S. diplomatic relations with Cuba, and incurred the wrath of the pro-Israeli lobby for recognising Palestine as a nation state.

In fact, most of his pronouncements are closely in line with the United Nations – and specifically its socio-economic agenda.

In his 184-page Encyclical released Thursday, the Pope says “Our immense technological development has not been accompanied by a development in human responsibility, values and conscience.”

“Faced with the global deterioration of the environment, I want to address every person who inhabits this planet. In this Encyclical, I especially propose to enter into discussion with everyone regarding our common home.”

The Pope also complains how weak international political responses have been.

“The failure of global summits on the environment make it plain that our politics are subject to technology and finance,” he said.

There are too many special interests, and economic interests easily end up trumping the common good and manipulating information so that their own plans will not be affected, the Pope declared.

Speaking on the global environment last year, he said: “The monopolising of lands, deforestation, the appropriation of water, inadequate agro-toxics are some of the evils that tear man from the land of his birth.”

“Climate change, the loss of biodiversity and deforestation are already showing their devastating effects in the great cataclysms we witness,” he added.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who has consistently warned against the devastating effects of climate change, praised Pope Francis for his papal encyclical which highlights that “climate change is one of the principal challenges facing humanity, and that it is a moral issue requiring respectful dialogue with all parts of society.”

He agreed with the encyclical’s findings that there is “a very solid scientific consensus” showing significant warming of the climate system and that most global warming in recent decades is “mainly a result of human activity”.

Ban urged governments to place the global common good above national interests and to adopt an ambitious, universal climate agreement in Paris this year.

Tim Gore, Oxfam International Climate Adviser, told IPS the Pope has set out how climate change is at its most basic a moral issue – it is a deep injustice that the pollution of the world’s richest people and countries drives harmful climate disruption in the poorest communities and countries.

“Anyone that is concerned about injustice should rightly be concerned about climate change, and in making his call, the Pope joins many other leaders of faith, civil society and trade unions. Climate change is all of our business,” he said.

Janet Redman, director of the Climate Policy Programme at the Washington-based Institute for Policy Studies, said: “Pope Francis is crystal clear — the current development model, based on the intensive use of coal, oil, and even natural gas, has to go. In its place, we need renewable sources of energy and new modes of production and consumption that rein in global warming.”

Taxing carbon, divesting from fossil fuels, and ending public corporate welfare for polluters can help end the stranglehold dirty energy companies have on our governments, economies and societies, she added.

In a statement released Thursday, former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, currently chair of the Africa Progress Panel and Kofi Annan Foundation, said as Pope Francis reaffirms, climate change is an all-encompassing threat.

“It is a threat to our security, our health, and our sources of fresh water and food. Such conditions could displace tens of millions of people, dwarfing current migration and fuelling further conflicts,” Annan said.

“I applaud the Pope for his strong moral and ethical leadership. We need more of such inspired leadership. Will we see it at the climate summit in Paris?,” he added.

In the United States, the criticisms have come mostly from right-wing conservatives, who want the Pope to confine himself to religion, not politics.

Representative Jeff Duncan, a Republican from South Carolina and a strong supporter of Israel, said Pope Francis should avoid the Palestine debate altogether – the Vatican should focus on spiritual matters and stay out of politics.

Asked Tuesday, just ahead of the Pope’s statement on climate change, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, who is running for the Republican nomination for the U.S. presidency, said: “I think religion ought to be about making us better as people, less about things [that] end up getting into the political realm.”

Edited by Kitty Stapp

The writer can be contacted at thalifdeen@aol.com

Candlelight vigil co-organised by 350.org, the global grassroots climate movement, held just before the Pope's visit to the Philippines in January this year. Photo credit: LJ Pasion

By Edwin Gariguez
MANILA, Jun 17 2015 (IPS)

My country, the Philippines, is one of the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. Even though we are among those countries that hardly contributed emissions and benefited least from burning fossil fuels, we find ourselves at the frontline of the climate crisis.

The catastrophe we experienced from Super Typhoon Haiyan [in early November 2013], one of the most powerful storms ever recorded, which killed thousands and damaged billions of properties, is proof to this. Almost two years later, our people are still struggling to recover from its devastating impact.“If it is wrong to wreck the planet, then it is wrong to benefit from its wreckage; a growing global movement to divest from fossil fuels takes this ethos at heart”

It should therefore not come as a surprise that concern about climate change is higher in the Philippines than elsewhere. A recent public consultation showed that 98 percent of Filipinos are “very concerned” about the impacts of climate change, compared with a global average of around 78 percent.

The Church cannot remain a passive bystander. It is our moral imperative to give voice to the voiceless.

The Catholic Church in the Philippines has pronounced its strong opposition to coal mining because it will make our country contribute to climate change, and endanger ecosystems as well as the health and lives of people.

Our churches have often led the struggles against dirty energy. In my hometown of Atimonan, Quezon, for example, more than 1,500 protesters led by church leaders staged a demonstration against a proposed coal-fired power plant last week.

Similarly, Catholic priests in Batangas are at the forefront of the fight against the construction of a new coal power plant. Last month, about 300 priests held a prayer rally ahead of a committee hearing that discussed the project.

Pope Francis also understands that climate change is not only an environmental issue but a matter of justice. His upcoming encyclical is anticipated to bring the link between climate change and the poor to centre stage.

In the Philippines, we are grateful that Pope Francis came to visit and held mass in areas hit the hardest by Typhoon Haiyan.

We admire him for standing in solidarity with us, using his position to inject momentum for faith communities around the world to take a moral stance on climate change.

A papal encyclical is an extraordinary way to send a powerful message to world leaders whose actions to date lag far behind the scale of the response that is necessary.

We hope that the Pope’s message will remind world leaders of their moral duty to act as we approach the climate summit in Paris [in December], where a new international climate agreement is supposed to be reached.

The moral imperative to act could not be stronger and the world now needs to stand united in the face of the climate crisis that knows no geographic boundaries, while the worst impacts still can be avoided.

Through the Pope’s encyclical, the Church will raise critical issues that need to be taken into account in the global response to this unprecedented threat.

Global capitalism has lifted millions out of poverty by burning fossil fuels. On the flipside, it has also created vast inequalities and sacrificed the environment for the sake of short-term gain. Now is the time to break the stranglehold of fossil fuels over our lives and the planet.

If it is wrong to wreck the planet, then it is wrong to benefit from its wreckage; a growing global movement to divest from fossil fuels takes this ethos at heart.

The Pope’s critique of today’s destructive, fossil-fuel dependent economy will not go down well with the powerful interests that benefit from today’s status quo.

But we, the Church and the people of the Philippines, will stand alongside the Pope as strong allies in the struggle for a socially just, environmentally sustainable and spiritually rich world that Pope Francis and the broader climate movement are fighting for.

Edited by Phil Harris    

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

Billboard for the referendum called to strengthen a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption in Slovakia in February. It says: WE ARE DECIDING ABOUT CHILDREN'S FUTURES. LET'S PROTECT THEIR RIGHT TO A MOTHER AND FATHER. Credit: Pavol Stracansky/IPS

By Pavol Stracansky
BRATISLAVA, Mar 15 2015 (IPS)

Lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) groups in Central and Eastern Europe, which still faced mixed prospects as they fight for rights and acceptance, are now taking some heart from the “failure” of a referendum in Slovakia, a member of the European Union.

Last month, a referendum called to strengthen a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage and same-sex adoption in Slovakia was declared invalid after only just over 20 percent of voters turned out.

The controversial plebiscite was heavily criticised by international rights groups, which said it pandered to homophobic discrimination and was allowing human rights issues affecting a minority group to be decided by a popular majority vote.

The campaigning ahead of the vote had often been bitter and vitriolic, including public homophobic statements by clergy, and a controversial negative commercial about gay adoption, which Slovak TV stations refused to broadcast and eventually only appeared on internet.The reasons behind the relative societal intolerance towards LGBT groups in Central and Eastern Europe vary from entrenched conservative attitudes rooted in countries’ isolation under communism, to local political aims and the influence of the Catholic Church.

The commercial showed a child in an orphanage being told that his new parents were coming to collect him and, after two men appear at the door, asking: “Where’s Mum?”

Activists here say that the referendum’s outcome was a sign that, despite this campaigning, Slovaks know that LGBT people pose “no threat” to society and has positively furthered discussion about allowing registered partnerships in the country.

Martin Macko, head of the Bratislava-based LGBT rights group Inakost, told IPS: “The referendum showed that people consider the family important, but that they do not see same-sex families as a threat to traditional families. The long-term perspective regarding discussions on registered partnerships in Slovakia is positive.”

Importantly, the result has also been welcomed in other parts of Central and Eastern Europe where many LGBT groups still face intolerance and discrimination.

Evelyne Paradis, Executive Director of international LGBT rights group ILGA-Europe told IPS: “LGBT activists across Europe have welcomed the outcome of the Slovak vote … hopefully the referendum will lead to a constructive discussion about equality in Slovakia. At the same time, we know that there is a broad diversity of views in the region which means that much work remains to be done before full equality is realised.”

Compared with Western Europe, attitudes in many countries in Central and Eastern Europe to LGBT people and issues are often much more conservative and in some states actively hostile.

The Czech Republic, whose larger cities have relatively open and vibrant gay communities, is the only country in the region which allows for registered partnerships of same-sex couples.

In other countries, such as Slovakia, Hungary, Croatia and Poland, marriage is defined constitutionally as only between a man and a woman. In January this year, Macedonia’s parliament voted to adopt a similar clause in its constitution.

Adoption by same sex couples is banned in all states in the region while other important legislation relating to LGBT issues is also absent. In Bulgaria, for instance, inadequate legislation means that homophobic crimes are investigated and prosecuted as ‘hooliganism’. This, activists claim, creates a climate of fear for LGBT people.

Poor records on minority rights in general in places like, for instance, Ukraine, mean that while the state may ostensibly be committed to LGBT rights, such communities are in reality extremely vulnerable.

In Russia, legislation actively represses same-sex relationships, with federal laws criminalising promotion of any non-heterosexual lifestyle, while Lithuania has legal provisions banning the promotion of homosexuality.

Deeply negative attitudes towards homosexuals are widespread in some societies. A 2013 survey in Ukraine showed that two-thirds of people thought homosexuality was a perversion, while a study in the same year in Lithuania showed that 61 percent of LGBT people said they had suffered discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity.

Isolated verbal and physical attacks and passive intolerance among more conservative groups are common across the region. But in some countries, specifically Russia, anyone even suspected of being non-heterosexual faces open, organised and sometimes lethally violent persecution.

Natalia Tsymbalova, an LGBT rights activist from St Petersburg, was forced to flee Russia in September last year after receiving death threats. Now claiming asylum in Spain, she was one of at least 12 LGBT activists who left Russia last year.

Speaking from Madrid, she told IPS about the continuing repression of LGBT people in her home country.

She said that although state propaganda campaigns had “switched to ‘Ukrainian fascists’ and the West” being portrayed as the public’s greatest enemy instead of LGBT people since the annexation of Crimea and the start of the Ukraine conflict, “state homophobia has not disappeared”.

“It has just faded into the background,” she added, “no longer making top headlines in the news, but it is still there and it has never left. The number of hate crimes is not falling, and they are being investigated as badly as before.”

The reasons behind the relative societal intolerance towards LGBT groups in Central and Eastern Europe vary from entrenched conservative attitudes rooted in countries’ isolation under communism, to local political aims and the influence of the Catholic Church.

In Slovakia, a strongly Catholic country where the Church’s influence can be extremely strong in many communities, supporters of the referendum welcomed Pope Francis’ personal endorsement of their cause.

It has been speculated that the conservative Alliance for Family movement, which initiated the referendum, is funded by Slovakia’s Catholic Church and that the Church was the driving force behind moves to bring about the vote.

In Lithuania, another strongly Catholic country, Church officials have supported laws restricting LGBT rights and have openly called homosexuality a perversion.

However, some rights activists also say that politicians in countries struggling economically or looking to entrench their own power can often use minorities, including LGBT people, as easy political targets to gain voter support.

ILGA’s Paradis told IPS: “Unfortunately many political leaders use the LGBT community as scapegoats … from activists we often hear that they do this to hide ‘real problems’ in countries, such as youth unemployment, access to education and healthcare. They promote ‘traditional family values’ as the way to rescue society. Sadly, in doing this, political leaders build a climate of intolerance and hatred.”

Saying that Russian politicians are now using homophobia to push wider agendas, Tsymbalova told IPS: “Homophobia plays an important role in the anti-Western rhetoric of President [Vladimir] Putin and his fellows. It is one of the main points of the conservative values that they try to promote and the public still has negative attitudes toward LGBT communities.”

The outcome of the Slovak referendum has left activists there more optimistic about the future for LGBT people in their country.

They are now pushing for discussions with the government about introducing registered partnerships and they hope that LGBT communities in other countries in the region will be heartened by the result or that, at least, people hoping to organise similar referendums will reconsider what they are doing.

Macko of Inakost told IPS: “Religious groups in some Balkan and Baltic countries are considering organising similar referendums and we really hope this will discourage them.”

Paradis told IPS that while the Slovak referendum had already been welcomed by many of its member groups in Central and Eastern Europe, progress on LGBT issues in many countries, including registered partnerships, was unlikely to be swift. “There indeed is more discussion in the region on granting rights to same sex partnerships, but what we see is a very mixed picture.”

However, the outlook for LGBT people in some places remains grim. Tsymbalova told IPS that many LGBT people in her home country have given up hope of any positive changes in the foreseeable future.

“In our community, there is almost no one who believes that the situation for LGBT people in Russia will seriously change for the better any time soon. Under the existing regime, which promotes and exploits homophobia, these changes will not happen and there is almost no hope of a regime change, so expectations are gloomy.”

She added: “Many LGBT activists have either left Russia, like me, or are going to. [As] for same-sex registered partnerships, it would take several decades to be accepted in Russia and I don’t believe I will see this in my lifetime. It is completely out of the question for the next 20 or 30 years.”

Edited by Phil Harris    

Many in the Vanni struggle due to a combination of poverty, war-related injuries and untreated trauma. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

By Amantha Perera
VAVUNIYA, Sri Lanka , Jan 20 2015 (IPS)

In four months’ time, Sri Lanka will mark the sixth anniversary of the end of its bloody civil conflict. Ever since government armed forces declared victory over the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) on May 19, 2009, the country has savored peace after a generation of war.

Suffocating security measures have given way to a sense of normalcy in most parts of the country, while steady growth has replaced patchy economic progress – averaging above six percent since 2009.

But these changes have largely eluded the area where the war was at its worst: the Vanni, a vast swath of land in the Northern Province that the LTTE ruled as a de facto state, together with the Jaffna Peninsular, for over a quarter of a century.

Home to over a million people, one-fourth of whom are war returnees, the Vanni has been in the doldrums since ballots replaced bullets.

“Peace should mean prosperity, but that is what we don’t have. What we have is a struggle to survive from one day to another,” Kajitha Shanmugadasan, an 18-year-old girl from the northern town of Pooneryn, told IPS.

She said youth her age were frustrated that multi-billion dollar infrastructure projects have failed to deliver decent jobs. “Look around, we have new highways, new railway lines, but no jobs, for five years people have been suffering, and it should not be [so] when there is peace,” she asserted.

Youth from the Northern Province have historically performed well at national exams, even during conflict times. That trend has held true: at the 2013 university entrance exam, 63.8 percent of those who sat their papers gained the scores required to enter the country’s top universities, a national high.

But with unemployment also at record levels here, and hardly any jobs for university graduates, those like Shanmugadasan are either staying out of universities or leaving the province in search of better prospects.

A new government, the result of presidential elections just a week into the New Year, and the Papal visit to the heart of the former battle zone on Jan. 14, have given rise to new hopes in the Vanni that life will improve for the ordinary people, who suffered during the war and have had little respite since the guns fell silent.

The 72-percent voter turnout in the Northern Province at the Jan. 8 presidential poll – an all-time high for the region – is a reminder to the new regime how desperate the people here are for real change.

During Sri Lanka’s civil conflict, life in the war zone was dominated by the fighting. Thousands of youth either joined the Tigers or were conscripted into their units. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

A small child and a woman sit next to LTTE cadres training in a public playground in Kilinochchi, a district in the Northern Province, in this picture taken in June 2004. The Tigers held sway over all aspects of life in areas they controlled until their defeat in 2009. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

Now, young people have more freedom than they did under the Tigers, but many are frustrated by the lack of proper employment opportunities six years after being promised a peace dividend by the government in Colombo. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

A youth who lost his leg during the conflict stands by his vegetable stall in the town of Mullaitivu in northern Sri Lanka. He has a small family to look after and says he finds it extremely hard to provide for them. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

A quarter of a million people who were displaced during the last phase of the war, along with tens of thousands of others who fled at other stages of the conflict, have moved back to the Vanni. Many families with small children continue to live in slum-like conditions, as a funding shortfall has left many without proper houses. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

Women have been forced to take up the role of breadwinner, with aid agencies suggesting that single females – either widows or women whose partners went missing during the war – now head over 40,000 households in the province. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

A woman stands in front of this small business she operates in Mullaitivu. The single mother was able to open the shop with the help of a grant she received from the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

The war left tens of thousands disabled, but six years on there are hardly any programmes or facilities that cater to this community. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

This man, a former member of the LTTE who was blinded in one eye during the war, bicycles over 20 km each day in search of work. A father of one, he has found it hard to adjust to post-war life. Credit: Amantha Perer/IPS

Other former Tigers, like this rehabilitated cadre-turned-barber, were fortunate to benefit from government-sponsored aid programmes. Here, the one-time militant attends to a client at his barber’s shop in the village of Mallavi in Sri Lanka’s north. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

Many in the Vanni struggle due to a combination of poverty, war-related injuries and untreated trauma. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

The immediate aftermath of the war saw thousands of tourists flocking to the region, gawking at the remnants of a bloody past. Their numbers have since dwindled and a war tourist trail now remains mostly deserted. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

The election of a new president and the visit of Pope Francis to the former war zone – two monumental events coming within five days of each other in early January – have raised hopes in the north that real, lasting change is close at hand. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

Over 500,000 people gathered at the Madhu Shrine in Sri Lanka’s former conflict zone to hear Pope Francis talk of national reconciliation and healing after two-and-a-half decades of sectarian bloodshed. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

By Amantha Perera
MADHU, Sri Lanka, Jan 15 2015 (IPS)

Jessi Jogeswaran, a 20-year-old woman from Sri Lanka’s northern Jaffna district, waited over six hours with 18 friends in the sweltering heat just to get a glimpse of Pope Francis on Jan. 14.

The much-anticipated Papal visit brought well over a million people out into the streets to hear the pontiff’s sermons, first in the capital Colombo and later on in Madhu, a village in Sri Lanka’s northwestern Mannar District.

“If we know what happened to all those who went missing, or what will happen to all those still in prison after the war, we will know that things have changed." -- Ramsiyah Pachchanlam, community empowerment officer with the Vanni Rehabilitation Organisation for the Differently Abled (VAROD)
Young and old alike congregated at designated sites, including those like Jogeswaran who traveled miles to be present for the historic occasion.

The young woman with a disarming smile hides a terrible tale: as an 11-year-old, she endured three years of death and mayhem in her native village of Addankulam in Mannar, caught between advancing government forces and military units of the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) who at the time controlled a vast swath of land in the north of Sri Lanka.

The six-member family’s flight began in 2007, at the tail-end of the country’s civil conflict, and would last almost two years before, in tattered clothes, they escaped the final bouts of fighting in April 2009.

“The nightmare has not ended, it has become less intense,” Jogeswaran told IPS, sitting in the compound of the Madhu Shrine, a church nestled in the jungle that is home to a statue of the Virgin Mary, which millions around the country believe to be miraculous.

Jogeswaran said that despite the war’s end, thousands of people in the north were still fighting to escape the crutches of abject poverty, recover from the traumatic events of the last days of the war and reunite with relatives lost in the chaos of prolonged battles over a period of 26 years.

“We need peace, both within and without,” she added.

Delivering a short sermon at the shrine, Pope Francis echoed her sentiments.

“No Sri Lankan can forget the tragic events associated with this very place,” he said, referring to the attacks on the church and its use by local residents as a place of refuge during extreme bouts of fighting.

He also acknowledged that the healing process would be hard, and that sustained effort would be required “to forgive, and find peace.”

For scores of people here, however, the wounds are too many to forget. The over 225,000 who were displaced during the war have now returned to a region where some parts boast poverty rates over four times the national average of six percent.

There is an urgent need for some 138,000 houses, amidst a funding shortfall of 300 million dollars. Nearly six years after the war’s end there could be as many as 40,000 missing people, although the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has records of little above 16,000 dating back over two decades.

While the completion of several large infrastructure projects suggested rapid development of the former war zone – including reconstruction of the 252-km-long rail-line connecting the north and south at a cost of 800 million dollars – few can enjoy the perks, with 5.2 percent unemployment in the Northern Province.

A lack of job opportunities is particularly hard on war widows and female-headed households – estimated at between 40,000 and 55,000 – and the nearly 12,000 rehabilitated LTTE combatants, among whom unemployment is a soaring 11 percent.

Untreated trauma, coupled with a lifting of the LTTE’s long-standing ban on the sale and production of liquor, has pushed alcohol dependency to new heights.

With scores of people seeking solace in the bottle, the northern Mullaitivu District recently recorded the second-highest rate of alcohol consumption in the island: some 34.4 percent of the population identify as ‘habitual users of alcohol’.

Finally, despite the war’s end, there has been no progress on power devolution to the Tamil-majority Northern Province, a root cause of the war.

A new political era: A bright future for the North?

The week before the Papal visit, Sri Lanka underwent a seismic change in its political landscape, when long-time President Mahinda Rajapaksa was defeated by Maithripala Sirisena, who campaigned with the support of a wide array of political parties including those representing Sinhala extremists and others representing the minority Tamil and Muslim populations.

Jogeswaran, who voted to elect a national leader for the first time at the Jan. 8 poll, told IPS that she felt nervously optimistic that things would change.

“We have a new president, who has promised change, now it is up to him to not deceive the voters,” she said.

Ramsiyah Pachchanlam, community empowerment officer with the Vanni Rehabilitation Organisation for the Differently Abled (VAROD), told IPS the northern population was desperate for things to improve.

“There are new roads, new electricity stations and a new train line, but no new jobs,” Pachchanlam said, commenting on the over three billion dollars worth of infrastructure investments made under the former Rajapaksa administration that has not trickled down to the people.

The Sirisena government has shown some signs that it was much more amenable to the needs of minority Tamils than its predecessor.

In his first week in office, Sirisena replaced the long-standing governor of the Northern Province, G. A. Chandrasiri – a former military officer – with G. S. Pallihakara, a career diplomat.

The appointment of a civilian officer to the post was a key demand of the Northern Provincial Council controlled by the Tamil National Alliance (TNA), which had previously accused the former governor of stifling the council’s independence by carrying out instructions received directly from Colombo.

Many hope that greater political autonomy will pave the way to resolution of the most burning issues plaguing the people.

“If we know what happened to all those who went missing, or what will happen to all those still in prison after the war, we will know that things have changed,” social worker Pachchanlam said.

It remains to be seen if change will happen on the ground, but for a brief moment, in that jungle shrine, thousands came together in hope and expectation of a brighter future.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

By Mairead Maguire
BELFAST, Dec 18 2014 (IPS)

I recently visited Assisi, the home of St. Francis and St. Clare, two great spirits whose lives have inspired us and millions of people around the world.

St. Francis, a man of peace, and St. Clare, a woman of prayer, whose message of love, compassion, care  for humans, animals and  the environment comes down through history to speak to us in a very relevant and inspirational way.

Mairead Maguire

Today, in the 2lst century, as we the human family face increasing violence, we are challenged to admit that we are on the wrong path, and that we need to find new ways of thinking and doing things from a global perspective.

Peace is a beautiful gift to have in life, and it is particularly treasured by those who have known violent conflict, war, famine, disease and poverty.  I believe that Peace is a basic human right for every individual and all people.

Love for others and respect for their rights and their human dignity, irrespective of who or what they are, no matter what religion – or none – that they choose to follow, will bring about real change and set in motion proper relationships.  With such relationships built on equality and trust, we can work together on so many of the threats to our common humanity.“For the first three hundred years after Christ, the early Christian communities lived in total commitment to Jesus’s non-violence. Sadly, for the next 1700 years, Christian mainline churches have not believed, taught or lived Jesus’s simple message: love your enemies, do not kill”

Poverty is one such threat and Pope Francis challenges us to take care of the poor, and has declared his desire that the Catholic Church be a church of the poor and for the poor. To meet this challenge, we can each ask ourselves ‘how will what I do today help the poor’?.

Pope Francis also has spoken about the need to build fraternity amongst the nations. This is important because building trust amongst people and countries will help bring peace to our interdependent, inter-connected world.

Violence begets violence as we witness every day on our television screens, so the choice between violence and non-violence, is up to each one of us.  However, if we do not teach non-violence in our education systems and in our religious institutions, how can we make that choice?

I believe that all faith traditions and secular societies need to work together and teach the way of non-violence as a way of living, also as a political science and means for bringing about social and political change wherever we live.

A grave responsibility lies with the different religious traditions to give spiritual guidance and a clear message, particularly on the questions of economic injustice, ‘armed resistance‘, arms, militarism and war.

As a Christian living in a violent ethnic political conflict in Northern Ireland, and caught between the violence of the British army and the Irish Republican Army, I was forced to confront myself with the questions, ‘do you ever kill?’ and ‘is there such a thing as a just war?’.

During my spiritual journey I reached the absolute conviction that killing is wrong and that the just war theory is, in the words of the late Fr. John L. McKenzie, “a phony piece of morality”.

I became a pacifist because I believe every human life is sacred and we have no right to kill each other. When we deepen our love and compassion for all our brothers and sisters, it is not possible to torture or kill anyone, no matter who they are or what they do. 

I also believe that Jesus was a pacifist and I agree with McKenzie when he writes: “if we cannot know from the New Testament that Jesus rejected violence absolutely, then we can know nothing of Jesus’ person or message. It is the clearest of themes.”

For the first three hundred years after Christ, the early Christian communities lived in total commitment to Jesus’s non-violence. Sadly, for the next 1700 years, Christian mainline churches have not believed, taught or lived Jesus’s simple message: love your enemies, do not kill.

During the last 1700 years, Christians have moved so far away from the Christic life of non-violence that we find ourselves in the terrible dilemma of condemning one kind of homicide and violence while paying for, actively participating in or supporting homicidal violence and war on a magnitude far greater than that which we condemn in others.

There is indeed a longstanding defeat in our theology. To help us out of this dilemma, we need to hear the full gospel message from our Christian leaders.

We need to reject the ‘just war’ theology and develop a theology in keeping with Jesus’ non-violence.

Some Christians believe that the ‘just war’ theory can be applied and that they can use violence – that is, ‘armed struggle/armed resistance’ – or can be adopted by governments to justify ongoing war.

It is precisely because of this ‘bad’ theology that we need, from our spiritual or religious leaders, a clear message and an unambiguous proclamation that violence is not the way of Jesus, violence is not the way of Christianity, and that armaments, nuclear weapons, militarism and war must be abolished and replaced with a more human and moral way of solving our problems without killing each other. (END/IPS COLUMNIST SERVICE)

(Edited by Phil Harris)

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

“Never was there a greater need than now for all the religions to combine, to pull their wisdom and to give the benefit of that combined, huge repository of wisdom to international law and to the world.”

The words are those of Christopher Weeramantry, former judge at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and its vice-president from 1997 to 2000, who was addressing a session on faiths united against nuclear weapons at the civil society forum organised by the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) on Dec. 6 and 7 in the Austrian capital.

Former ICJ judge Christopher Weeramantry. Credit: Henning Blatt, Wikimedia

Weeramantry strongly criticised the argument of those who claim that nuclear weapons have saved the world from another world war in the last 50 years.

He pointed to the ever-present danger represented by these weapons and said that on many occasions it had been luck that had prevented catastrophic nuclear accidents or the breaking out of a devastating nuclear war.

Noting that nuclear weapons “offend every single principle of religion,” Weeramantry was joined on the panel by a number of different religious leaders, including Mustafa Ceric, Grand Mufti of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ela Gandhi, granddaughter of Mahatma Gandhi and peace activist, as well as Akemi Bailey-Haynie, national women’s leader of the Buddhist organisation Soka Gakkai International-USA.

Although there often seems to be a gap between the positions of different faith communities concerning different issues, all panellists were very clear in pushing the moral imperative and declaring the similar values that are inherent to all religions.“The atom bomb mentality is immoral, unethical, addictive and only evil can come from it” – Mahatma Gandhi

According to Mustafa Ceric, it “is not the question of whether you believe, it is the question of whether we are going to wait and see the destruction of our planet.”

Ceric also stressed that the goals and values of humanity are defined by common moral and ethical standards and that the role of religious communities today is greater than ever. Faced with fear and mistrust in society, he said, they also have the responsibility to care for peace and security in the world.

Akemi Bailey-Haynie continued with an emotional statement from first-hand experience – her own mother was a survivor of the Hiroshima bombing in 1945.

“When nuclear weapons are considered a deterrent or viable option in warfare, it seems from a mind-set that fundamentally denies that all people possess infinite potential. No one has the right to take away a precious life of another human being.”

Akemi Bailey-Haynie, national women’s leader of the Buddhist organisation Soka Gakkai International-USA. Credit: SGI

For Bailey-Haynie, nuclear weapons serve no purpose other than mass destruction. They have devastating effects on human beings and the environment, and the possibility of nuclear accidents or potential terrorism cannot be ruled out, she said, adding that dialogue between people of different or opposing opinions is the beginning to achieve change regarding this issue.

“As a second generation survivor, I deeply feel the sorrow, as well as the outrage, born of not being able to yet live in a time when the most inhumane of weapons, nuclear weapons, have been banned,“ she concluded.

Desmond Tutu, Nobel Peace Laureate and former Anglican Bishop, sent a video message to participants to express his deep solidarity and support for ICAN’s civil society forum initiative.

He argued that the best way to honour the victims of the incidents in Hiroshima and Nagasaki was to negotiate a total ban on nuclear weapons to ensure that nothing comparable could ever happen again.

Two of the session’s speakers, Ela Gandhi and Mustafa Ceric, also attended the Dec. 8-9 Vienna Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons.

There, Ela Gandhi delivered a speech in the spirit of her grandfather who, she said, would have joined the movement to abolish nuclear weapons if still alive.

As Gandhi had dedicated his life to teaching humanity that there is a non-violent way of dealing with conflict, he even condemned nuclear weapons himself in 1946 when he said: “The atom bomb mentality is immoral, unethical, addictive and only evil can come from it.”

Pointing out that the mere existence of nuclear weapons leads to similar armament of rival countries, Ela Gandhi warned that these nuclear arsenals could destroy a chance for future generations to survive and have a prosperous life.

The Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons was the scene of intense and often emotional discussions among official representatives from over 160 countries, victims and civil society participants. Notably, both the United States and the United Kingdom were officially represented for the first time at a conference where their nuclear arsenals were subject to debate and criticism.

Religion played an important role at the conference, where many lobbying groups had religious backgrounds, and the opening ceremony was addressed by Pope Francis.

“I am convinced that the desire for peace and fraternity, planted deep in the human heart, will bear fruit in concrete ways to ensure that nuclear weapons are banned once and for all, to the benefit of our common home,” aid Pope Francis, expressing his hope that “a world without nuclear weapons is truly possibly.”

In a statement on behalf of faith communities to the final session, Kimiaki Kawai, Program Director for Peace Affairs at Soka Gakkai International (SGI), said: “The elimination of nuclear weapons is not only a moral imperative; it is the ultimate measure of our worth as a species, as human beings.”

He said that “acceptance of the continued existence of nuclear weapons stifles our capacity to think more broadly and more compassionately about who we are as human beings, and what our potential is. Humanity must find alternative ways of dealing with conflict.”

(Edited by Phil Harris)

By Mario Lubetkin
ROME, Dec 10 2014 (IPS)

The vast international and national media impact of the Second International Conference on Nutrition (ICN2), held in Rome from Nov. 19 to 21, demonstrated the growing interest that nutritional problems are arousing worldwide, primarily because the media themselves are increasingly reporting issues related to poverty and exclusion.

Thousands of articles in leading newspapers from different countries of the world, numerous television reports and substantial social media activity focused on ICN2, jointly held by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO), 22 years after the first international nutrition conference, also in Rome.

Global representation was ensured through participation by more than 100 ministers and deputy ministers as the leading actors responsible for nutrition-related matters in their respective countries.

Mario Lubetkin

With a policy document and a framework for action containing over 60 points, adopted by consensus and applicable at national and international levels, this conference completed one phase and launched another whose results will be seen in the years to come.

Unlike other international meetings of this nature, this time the media highlighted the interventions of keynote speakers and the final documents, but more importantly continued to publish information and thought pieces on nutrition for some weeks following the conference.

Nutrition has achieved visibility as an issue on the global news agenda, primarily because of its serious social ramifications in developing and developed countries alike.

Countless experts brought to the fore the inherent existing contradiction of having 800 million people suffering from hunger (albeit 200 million fewer than 20 years ago), while 500 million adults are suffering from obesity. The seriousness of the situation is compounded by the fact that the number of the latter is still rising and is resulting in serious health risks for the population at large.“Nutrition has achieved visibility as an issue on the global news agenda, primarily because of its serious social ramifications in developing and developed countries alike”

Suffice it to say that 42 million children are overweight, while malnutrition is the underlying cause of 45 percent of infant mortality.

Statistics indicate that unhealthy diets and lack of exercise are the cause of 10 percent of deaths and permanent disability cases.

Over two billion people, or approximately one-third of all humanity, suffer from micro-nutrient deficiencies.

The problem among children under five years of age is particularly distressing because 51 million suffer from wasting, or low weight for height, which in turn results in higher mortality from infectious diseases. Moreover, 161 million children in that particular age group also suffer from growth retardation.

Malnutrition also has high economic costs. Recent studies have indicated that malnutrition hunger, micro-nutrient deficiency and obesity result in annual costs of between 2.8 and 3.5 trillion dollars, or 4-5 percent of world gross domestic product (GDP). The per capita cost is estimated to be 400-500 dollars per year.

In his speech during the International Conference on Nutrition, Pope Francis said that “when solidarity is lacking in one country, it is felt around the world.”

Despite there being enough food for everyone, food issues are subject to manipulated information, corruption, claims regarding national security, or “teary-eyed evocations of economic crisis”, the Pontiff said. “That is the first challenge we need to overcome”, he asserted as he called for the rights of all human beings to be uppermost in all development assistance programmes.

The Pope also stressed the need to respect the environment and protect the planet. “Humans may forgive, but nature does not”, he argued, adding that “we must take care of Mother Nature, so that she does not respond with destruction”. In this way, he linked the debates on nutrition with the ongoing International Conference on Climate Change in Lima, Peru (Dec. 1-12).

However, despite the breadth of international coverage, it is noteworthy that the leading media did not fully analyse the conference’s Framework for Action, which essentially sets the course for gradual resolution of nutrition’s major challenges.

The Framework for Action proposes the enhancement of political commitments, promotion of national nutrition plans incorporating the different food security and nutrition stakeholders, an increase in responsible investment, the fostering of inter-country collaboration, whether it be North-South or South-South, and the strengthening of nutrition governance.

The Framework also recommends measures to achieve sustainable food systems, revise national policies and investments, promote crop diversification, upgrade technology, develop and adopt international guidelines on healthy diets, and encourage gradual reductions in consumption of saturated fats, sugar, salt or sodium.

The chapter on communications suggests the conduct of social marketing campaigns and lifestyle-change communication programmes promoting physical activity, dietary diversification, consumption of micronutrient-rich food products to include traditional local foods, and taking account of cultural factors.

Although the principal responsibility for implementing the Framework for Action rests with governments and parliaments, non-State actors such as civil society and the private sector have an important role to play by joining forces in ensuring that the proposals are put into action.

Throughout this process, the media have a crucial oversight role in ensuring that the challenges and proposed solutions identified by the Second International Conference on Nutrition become reality in the short and medium terms. (END/IPS COLUMNIST SERVICE)

(Edited by Phil Harris)

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

By Roberto Savio
ROME, Dec 4 2014 (IPS)

The fact that in a referendum Switzerland has taken a path that goes in the opposite direction from that of Europe is an unusual fact which calls for reflection, especially because Switzerland has taken a much more progressive path, while we all were accustomed to see it as a very conservative country.

On Nov. 30, Swiss citizens were asked to vote on a proposal for reducing immigrants to a maximum of 17,000 per year, compared with 88.000 in 2013. This was rejected by 73 percent of the voters, after a unanimous campaign by the government, industrialists and trade unions that without immigrants there would be serious problems in keeping the economy expanding.

Roberto Savio

It is worth noting that foreigners account for 23.5 percent of the population in Switzerland, compared with an average of 4 percent in Europe as a whole.

Another proposal in the same referendum called for dedicating 10 percent of Swiss international cooperation to birth control in poor countries in order to reduce their birth rate. It was clearly a racist proposal, and was also defeated. Swiss citizens have no right to decide birth policies in other countries.

While the Swiss were voting, British Prime Minister David Cameron was making public his proposal to drastically restrict European immigration. Europeans would be expelled if they did not find a job within six months. They would have work continuously for four years before having access to the country’s social benefits of the country. They would also face restrictions to their right to bring their families with them, even after finding a job.“The real problem is that Europe has a dramatic lack of real statesmen or stateswomen who are ready to go against the polls for the good of their country”

The same debate is going on in Germany, where the government is also carrying out a media campaign to popularise its bill of law which also contemplates the expulsion of European immigrants who do not find a job within six months. It is obvious that this will have a cascade effect in several other European countries.

In both cases, this is an attempt to undercut anti-European parties – the U.K. Independence Party (UKIP) which is on the rise in Britain and the Alternative for Germany (AfD) in Germany, although the AfD is not a threat like the UKIP and what Chancellor Angela Merkel is doing amounts to an act of populism.

There is a wave of xenophobia spreading throughout Europe. Marine Le Pen’s National Front is aiming to become the number one party in France. In Italy, the right-wing Northern League is growing by the day. Today there is a xenophobic and anti-European party in every country of Europe, with the notable exception of Spain, where the People’s Party has been able to make a right-wing party redundant.

What is striking is that all those parties are creating alliances and creating a pan-European rejection of the European Union. Marine Le Pen has just chaired a meeting in Lyon of seven extreme right-wing parties, like the Flemish Vlaame Belang in Belgium and the Dutch Party for Freedom of Geert Wilders.

What was even more striking was the presence of two leaders of Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party. Among Europe’s right-wing parties there is growing support for Putin, and a Russian bank, the First Czech-Russian Bank with headquarters in Moscow, has just given a loan of nine million dollars to the Le Pen’s National Front.

The reality is that Europe is in serious need of young immigrants to remain competitive internationally, and innumerable studies show that immigrants have a positive impact on the economy.

In England, immigrants account for 4.3 percent of the population, their rate of employment is 78.8 percent, slightly higher than the British average (73.6 percent), and just 15 percent of immigrants request some kind of subsidy. According to a study by University College London, European immigrants who arrived in the United Kingdom contributed more than 20 billion pounds to the country’s public finances between 2001 and 2011.

Similarly, all national and European studies on immigration show that immigrants request less subsidies than nationals, are net contributors in terms of taxation, and take jobs that nationals no longer want.

According to United Nations projections, Europe has a deficit of 20 million people if it wants to keep the pension system viable, but this is not simply “politically correct” at this moment. The very small minority of immigrants involved in crime is what everybody sees through strong media exposure, and the parties which are making their fortune are calling for a white and pure Europe again.

Pope Francis speaks about ethics and solidarity with immigrants, but if parties are able to ignore economics, just imagine ethics!

The Spanish National Institute of Statistics has just released its latest findings, and they are in line with similar studies everywhere in Europe. In 1976, 676,718 children were born in Spain – 18.7 babies for every 1,000 mothers. In 1995, there were 363,467 births – 9.2 babies for every 1,000 mothers.

For every 100 Spaniards of working age, 27.6 are over the age of 64 – by 2050, this figure will be closer to 73. An even more extreme figure comes from the Population Division of the United Nations. If the Spanish borders were to be closed and nobody could enter or leave, and with the growing reduction in the number of women of fertile age, by 2100 the Spanish population would stand at around 800,000 people!

We have just to look to the United States to see the opposite policy. Every year, young people bring constant expansion to the labour force and the economy. Not even the most rabid Republican speaks of abolishing immigration, just of keeping it at a lower rate.

Meanwhile, President Barack Obama is riding the issue of immigration due his shrinking popularity, but in the opposite direction. He wants to legalise as many illegal immigrants as possible … and there are already 52 million immigrants.

The real problem is that Europe has a dramatic lack of real statesmen or stateswomen who are ready to go against the polls for the good of their country. The best example is the powerful Angela Merkel, who has never taken any risk or any difficult decision (except on abolishing nuclear power, and that only because of the general aversion after the Japanese tsunami).

Merkel’s comment on the law on restricting European immigrants was: “Europe is not a social union”. In other words, the flow of capital is protected, the flow of workers is not.

In all this, the European Commission has been silent on immigration. And now, its President, Jean-Claude Juncker, unmoved by the revelations on how he helped hundreds of corporations to avoid taxes in Europe with deals in Luxembourg, is now presenting a development plan to which the Commission would contribute just 10 percent and the remaining 90 percent would be funded by the private sector… and that is his landmark!

Europe is clearly committing suicide and people will find out when it has already lost its position in world competition … only then, maybe, will the difference between a statesman and a politician become clear. (IPS/COLUMNIST SERVICE)

(Edited by Phil Harris)

The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, IPS – Inter Press Service. 

Excerpt:

By Roberto Savio
ROME, Nov 26 2014 (IPS)

After the Italian sea search-and-rescue operation Mare Nostrum at a cost of nine million euros a month, through which the Italian Navy has rescued nearly 100,000 migrants – although perhaps up to 3,000 have died – from the Mediterranean since October 2013, Europe is now presenting its new face in the Mediterranean.

The European Union is launching Joint Operation Triton with a monthly budget of 2.9 million euros and funds secured until the end of the year. Its function is to enforce border controls – not to save “boat people” – and it will patrol just thirty nautical miles from the coast, which pales in comparison with Italy’s Mare Nostrum operation which saw patrols being sent close to the Libyan coast.

Roberto Savio

Even with this very limited operation, British Prime Minister David Cameron has said that the United Kingdom will not contribute because operations that save migrants make them more willing to try to cross the Mediterranean. Of course, there is a perverted logic in this: the more migrants that die, the greater will be the discouragement for others to try.

Following this logic through, the ideal situation therefore would be to reach a death rate that would stop illegal immigration once and for all!

In this context, it is worth noting that the U.K. government is considering withdrawal from the European Convention of Human Rights (something that even Russian President Vladimir Putin has never considered). The argument is that nobody can be above U.K. courts.

London is also refusing to pay its share of increased of contributions to the European Union and is considering how to put an annual cap on the number of Europeans who are entitled to work legally in the United Kingdom.“Since 1986, the year of signing of the Single European Act, Europeans have never been able to agree on a minimum social basis, which would have given them rights as workers to act collectively as Europeans in the face of a market which is economically unified, but with no common social legislation”

And finally, the U.K. government received with great uproar the sentence of the European Court of Justice, which placed a European cap on banker bonuses, rejecting Britain’s claims that it was illegal. The British argument was that pay levels (also of discredited bankers) were part of social policy and thus under the authority of member states not of the European Union.

Meanwhile, the same Court has issued another sentence under which E.U. member states are not obliged to support European citizens who do not have economic activities in the E.U. countries to which they have migrated. And the German Parliament is now preparing a law to expel European immigrants who do not find a job within six months.

Of course, this will open the doors to all other countries to reduce the free movement of Europeans in Europe, a cornerstone of the original vision of a solidary Europe. Now Europeans will be obliged to take any job, and therefore the law of market will become the primary criterion for their movements in Europe.

Since 1986, the year of signing of the Single European Act, Europeans have never been able to agree on a minimum social basis, which would have given them rights as workers to act collectively as Europeans in the face of a market which is economically unified, but with no common social legislation.

In fact, the point has now been reached where social criteria are the last to be used to judge whether a country is recovering or not, well after economic and financial criteria.

A devastated Greece is now again being considered in financial markets because its economic indicators are on the up. And, at the last G20 meeting in Brisbane, Spain was touted as the example that austerity policies – those indicated by German Chancellor Angela Merkel as the example for laggards like Italy and France – are the correct way out of the crisis.

At the same time, a very different source, Caritas, has reported that only 34.3 percent of Spaniards live a normal life, while 40.6 percent are stuck in precariousness, 24.2 percent are already suffering moderate exclusion and 10.9 percent are living in severe exclusion.

To understand the trend, six years ago, 50.2 percent of Spaniards had a normal life. Now, one citizen in four is suffering exclusion, and of those 11 million excluded citizens, 77.1 percent have no job, 61.7 percent no house and 46 percent no health care support.

According to UNICEF’s recent report on children under recession, 76.5 million children in the rich countries live in poverty, and in Spain, 36.3 percent of the country’s children (2.7 million) are living in a state of precariousness.

What is now new is that some major financial institutions have started to draw attention to social issues.

Janet L. Yellen, chairwoman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, has declared that she is concerned about the growing inequality of wealth and income in the United States, and that chances for people to advance economically appear to be diminishing. And Mario Draghi, governor of the European Central Bank, is now constantly mentioning the issues of “unbearable unemployment “and “growing exclusion”.

In the background there is the proven fact that countries which took emergency measures to reduce public borrowing have mostly had weaker growth, like most European countries (with the exception of Germany, helped by a boom in machinery exports to Russia and China), while those which introduced a policy of stimulus, like the United States, Japan and Britain, have done much better, also in reducing unemployment.

But Merkel continues to ignore calls from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and other monetary institutions – she is only interested in pleasing her constituency, which is increasingly looking to its immediate interests and losing sight of European perspectives.

In all this, the banks continue to be uninterested in any social perspective. A few days ago, European and U.S. regulators imposed new fines worth 4.5 billion dollars on a number of major banks (we are now approaching the 200 billion dollar mark since the crisis started in 2008) for illegal activities.

Jamie Dimon, the CEO of the largest of them, JP Morgan, declared in an interview with Andrew Ross Sorkin of CNBC that it is important that United States creates a “safe harbour” where JPMorgan’s illegal practice of hiring the relatives of political leaders “is not punished”.

In Dimon’s country, between 2009 and 2010, 93 percent of economic growth ended up in the pockets of one percent of the population, according to Nobel economics laureate Joseph Stiglitz, and the 16,000 families with wealth of at least 111 million dollars have seen their share of national wealth double since 2012 to 11.2 percent.

The last U.S. presidential elections cost 3.4 billion dollars, and most of that came from this small minority. Democracy, where all votes are equal, is increasingly becoming a plutocracy where money elects.

Meeting leaders of social movements on Oct. 26, Pope Francis told them: “They call me a communist [for speaking of] land, work and housing … but love for the poor is at the centre of the Gospel.” Certainly, governments are doing otherwise …

(Edited by Phil Harris)

Excerpt:

Devotees pray to the 500-year-old statue of the Virgin Mary as it is paraded around the Madhu Church during the annual festival. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

By Amantha Perera
MADHU, Sri Lanka, Oct 27 2014 (IPS)

Rising out of a thick forest about 17 km from the nearest main road, the Madhu Church is a symbol of spiritual harmony and tranquility. When the wind blows you hear the leaves rustle. Other times a solemn silence hangs in the air. Old-timers say that once, almost an entire generation ago, the grass grew six feet high in the church compound, and elephants wandered through it.

Located some 300 km by road from Sri Lanka’s capital Colombo, this place is the most venerated Catholic shrine in the country, home to a 500-year-old statue of the Virgin Mary that millions of faithful people believe to be miraculous.

But the peaceful hush that surrounds this holy place is likely to be broken in the months to come.

“[Our Lady of Madhu] has survived so much for so long and is still with us, protecting us, keeping us safe." -- Benedict Fernando, a pilgrim from the coastal town of Negombo
Heavy construction work takes place round-the-clock here, as efforts to rebuild the side chapel of the Sacred Heart slowly bear fruit. It was severely damaged during a shelling incident in 2008 that, according to some priests, killed over three-dozen people who were seeking shelter, and left 60 injured.

New residential quarters are also underway and about four km from the church a new helipad is being planned. All this for the scheduled visit by Pope Francis set to take place during the second week of January 2015.

“It is a blessing from God, people not only here but all over the island are waiting to see him and hear him at this Church,” said Rev. S. Emilianuspillai, the administrator of the shrine.

The papal visit will be the crowning moment for the church and the relic enshrined within that survived some of the most turbulent and violent years of Sri Lanka’s modern history.

The administrator told IPS that despite some reports that the visit could be cancelled due to impending presidential elections, preparations were going ahead.

Located in the northwestern Mannar District, the church was within the war zone for much of Sri Lanka’s three-decade-long conflict. When heavy fighting engulfed the church compound in April 2008, it had been under the control of the separatist Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) for over a decade. The war ended a year later with the defeat of the Tigers by government forces.

Emilianuspillai still recalls those harrowing days six-and-a-half years ago when he and 16 others were trapped within the church as shells exploded all around. By 6.30 pm on Apr. 3, 2008, a decision was made to move the statue to a safer place. It was a journey fraught with danger, Emilianuspillai, said. Just a mile into the trip a shell fell right in front of the vehicle containing the relic, which the priest had cradled to his own body for safekeeping. “Absolutely nothing happened to it, or us,” he said.

Worshippers gather near the damaged chapel of the Sacred Heart in August 2009, just three months after the war’s end. Credit: Courtesy Amantha Perera

Little less than a year-and-a-half later, in August 2009, the same church compound was filled with over half a million worshippers for the first annual post-conflict feast, all seeking the blessings of their beloved Mother of Madhu.

Devotees revere the statue as a symbol of unity and peace, bringing together Tamils and Sinhalese, as well as Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists, all of whom would mingle during the massive annual feasts.

In the early days of Sri Lanka’s conflict, Madhu was also one of the largest refuges for those fleeing the fighting.

“[Our Lady of Madhu] has survived so much for so long and is still with us, protecting us, keeping us safe,” Benedict Fernando, a pilgrim from the coastal town of Negombo, about 250 km south of Madhu, told IPS.

Praying for reconciliation

Tamils living in the Northern Province also hope that the papal visit will shed light on burning post-war issues that have remained unresolved. The region is one of the poorest in the country with poverty levels sometimes thrice the national average of 6.7 percent. It has also been hit hard by an 11-month drought and losses to the vital agriculture sector. This despite the injection of over six billion dollars worth of government funds since 2009.

“There is a lot more work to be done,” Sellamuththu Sirinivasan, the additional government agent for the northern Kilinochchi District, told IPS.

Other lingering issues include the over 40,000 female-headed families in the Northern Province, struggling to make ends meet in a traditionally male-dominated society.

With assistance from the U.N. and other agencies slowing to a trickle, such vulnerable groups have been left to fend for themselves.

“The economic situation has stagnated despite the large investments in infrastructure. In such an environment, even able-bodied and qualified men and women find it hard to gain employment. These single women with families are really vulnerable [to] exploitation,” Saroja Sivachandran, who heads the Centre for Women and Development in northern Jaffna, told IPS.

Then there are those who went missing during the war.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has just begun the first countrywide survey of the families of the war missing. The survey and its recommendations are to be handed over to the government sometime in mid-2015. But there is still confusion over the number of missing, which some have put as high as 40,000. The ICRC says that it has recorded over 16,000 cases of missing persons since the 1990s.

“The war has ended, but the battles continue for us,” said Dominic Stanislaus, a young man from the town of Mankulam, about 60 km north.

On first glance, the Vanni, the popular name for the northern provinces, seems generations removed from the war years. Glistening new highways have replaced barely navigable roads marked by crater-sized potholes left by shells. A new rail line linking northern Jaffna to the rest of the country after a lapse of a quarter of a century was inaugurated earlier this month.

But burning questions about when the missing will return home, or where the next meal will come from, remain unanswered.

Many, like Stanislaus and Fernando, pray that the papal visit will hasten the healing process. In the meantime, the Madhu Church will continue to bring hope to thousands who still live with the wounds of war.

Edited by Kanya D’Almeida

"Who is more concerned than the rural family with regards to preservation of natural resources for future generations?" – Pope Francis. Credit: By CIAT [CC-BY-SA-2.0] via Wikimedia Commons

By Gloria Schiavi
ROME, Oct 17 2014 (IPS)

“Who is more concerned than the rural family with regards to preservation of natural resources for future generations?”

Pope Francis posed the question in a message read by Archbishop Luigi Travaglino, Permanent Observer of the Holy See for the celebration of World Food Day on Oct. 16 at the headquarters of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).

The Pope’s message went to the heart of this year’s World Food Day theme – Family Farming: Feeding the Planet, Caring for the Earth – as part of the International Year of Family Farming (IYFF).

The celebration of World Food Day offered an opportunity to share experiences and steps forward towards the eradication of hunger in a way that is sustainable for the future.

“Family farming is key in this effort”, said FAO Director-General José Graziano Da Silva, praising the contributions of farmers around the world. “For decades they were seen as a problem to be dealt with. The truth is that they are an important part of the solution to sustainable food security.”"For decades they [family farmers] were seen as a problem to be dealt with. The truth is that they are an important part of the solution to sustainable food security" – FAO Director-General José Graziano Da Silva

Food insecurity within the context of a growing world population, increasingly disruptive climate change and environmental destruction, scarce access to land and resources, discrimination against women and lack of financial support for smallholders and youth were some of the problems that were recognised as crucial in the global struggle to feed all.

Sustainable development and smart agriculture, climate change mitigation and adaptation to changing and more extreme conditions were raised as necessary strategies.

FAO figures show that increasing production is not the silver bullet – the world already produces 40 percent more than is needed.

Leslie Lipper, Senior Environmental Economist at FAO’s Economic and Social Department, raised the problem of access: “Today there is enough food in the world for everybody to be food secure, and we still have over 809 million people that are food insecure.”

“They don’t have the means to either buy or in some way get the food they need. We are looking at the need for an agriculture world strategy that increases income, not just production”, she added.

From a social perspective, Giuseppe Castiglione, Undersecretary at the Italian Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Forestry Policy, highlighted the role of family farmers in terms of employment and social inclusion, saying that they offer the opportunity of involving vulnerable people in a familiar working environment that is more welcoming than other forms of employment.

The International Year of Family Farming has been a demonstration of what the United Nations system does well: gathering people, starting dialogue, creating platforms for discussion, raising awareness and sharing knowledge.

In this context, many speakers called for policy-makers to follow up and implement strategies that permit the creation of supporting infrastructures. In fact, farmers’ challenges include distributing food efficiently, gaining access to markets and financial investments, reducing waste and improving quality.

“Financial services enable farmers to generate income and insulate themselves from income shocks”, said Queen Máxima of the Netherlands, the U.N. Secretary-General’s Special Advocate for Inclusive Finance for Development.

“Even a small amount of savings can mean that a mother does not have to sell her chickens or other income-earning assets in order to pay a doctor’s fee,” she added.

The crucial role of women as the backbone of agricultural production was not forgotten, and every speaker called for recognition of their role and for gender equality.

Santiago Del Solar Dorrego, Argentine agronomist and former president of a farmer group, suggested that while innovation is crucial, farmers should not go down that path alone if they do not have the scale to absorb the shock of failure. “Go together,” he said.

Jorge Anrango, responsible for food in rural and indigenous communities in the Ecuador delegation to FAO, talked to IPS about the experience of his country. “Everybody wanted to study, study, study. Nobody wanted to cultivate land”, he said, explaining that the IYFF has raised awareness of the importance of farming and has spurred people to return to the fields.

John Kufuor, former President of Ghana, highlighted the need for political leadership in policy-making for agriculture. He said that the 30 percent increase in rice production in his country had been made possible through offering landless people, women and youth degraded but usable land plots.

By providing them with access to training, markets and services, it had been possible to involve them in a system of plantation development and profit sharing and this programme had created jobs and improved income, food security and nutrition.

In a reference to the recent natural disasters that have hit the host country, Carlo Petrini, founder of Slow Food, a movement promoting local food systems, said that the floods and landslides that affected parts of northern Italy earlier in the month were the result of terrible hydrogeological conditions.

This, he explained, was because while family farmers used to clean canals and rivers and to ensure that the land was looked after, their role had been weakened, negatively affecting the public service they had once provided.

(Edited by Phil Harris)

The Italian Navy rescued 1,004 refugees and migrants on 14 August 2014. Some arrived barefoot, some children were shaking with cold. Men, women and children from Syria, Somalia, Gambia, Bangladesh and other countries were rescued. Credit: Amnesty International

By Matt Carr
MATLOCK, United Kingdom, Oct 10 2014 (IPS)

Since the end of the Cold War, the Mediterranean has become the most lethal of Europe’s barriers against irregular migration, having claimed nearly 20,000 migrant lives in the last two decades.  

And the first nine months of 2014 indicate that the phenomenon is on the rise, with more migrant deaths than in any previous year.

Last month, a report from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) reported that 3,072 migrants have drowned in the Mediterranean this year out of a worldwide total of 4,077 deaths worldwide.  These figures are almost certainly underestimates, because many migrant deaths in the Mediterranean are not reported.

In the same month, a report from Amnesty International on migrant deaths in the Mediterranean estimated that 2, 200 migrants died between the beginning of June and mid-September alone.“It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the Mediterranean has become an instrument in a policy of deterrence, in which migrant deaths are tacitly accepted as a form of ‘collateral damage’ in a militarised response to 21st century migration whose overriding objective is to stop people coming”

The worst incident in this period took place on Sep 11. when 500 men, women and children, many of them refugees from Syria and Palestinians from the Gaza Strip, drowned after their boat was deliberately rammed by their traffickers in Maltese territorial waters.

This horrendous crime took place less than one year after the horrific events of Oct. 3 last year, when at least 360 migrants drowned when their boat sank near the Italian island of Lampedusa.

At the time, the drownings at Lampedusa prompted an unprecedented outpouring of international anger and sympathy.

Pope Francis, European politicians such as Cecilia Malmstrom (European Commissioner for Home Affairs) and Juan Manuel Barroso (President of the European Commission), and  U.N. Secretary-General  Ban Ki-Moon all joined in the chorus of condemnation and called on Europe and the international community to take action to prevent such tragedies in the future.

Twelve months later, these worthy declarations have yet to be realised.

Following the Lampedusa tragedy, Italy undertook the largest combined naval/coastguard search and rescue operation in its history – known as ‘Operation Mare Nostrum’ – to coincide with Italian occupancy of the Presidency of the Council of the European Union.    At a cost of nine million euros per month, the operation has rescued 100,000 people.

Yet despite these efforts, the death toll is already four times higher than it was in the whole of last year.  This increase is partly due to the rise in the numbers of people crossing, primarily as a result of the Syrian civil war and the collapse of the Libyan state. This year, more than 130,000 migrants have crossed the Mediterranean, compared with 60,000 the previous year.

A group of Somali women, among those rescued by the Italian Navy vessel Virginio Fasan, between 13 and 14 August 2014. Credit: Amnesty International

These numbers have tested the resources of Malta and Italy.  Some drownings have occurred as a result of a lack of clarity and coordination between the two countries over their mutual search and rescue areas.  In addition, Malta has sometimes been reluctant to rescue migrant boats in distress – a reluctance that some observers attribute to an unwillingness on the part of the authorities to accept them as refugees.

But the European Union has also been conspicuously absent from the unfolding tragedy on its southern maritime borders.

Despite numerous calls from the Italian government for assistance, it was not until August this year that the European Union mandated ‘Frontex’ – the European border agency – to undertake ‘Operation Triton’ in the Mediterranean to complement Italy’s search and rescue operations.

But Frontex is primarily concerned with immigration enforcement rather than search and rescue, and the joint operations that it coordinates are entirely dependent on resources provided by E.U. member states.

Glaring lack of response

It is at this level that the lack of response is most glaring.  There are many things that European governments could do to implement to reduce migrant deaths.

They could use their navies to establish the ‘humanitarian corridors’ between North Africa and Europe, as the U.N. refugee agency UNCHR once suggested during the Libyan Civil War.  They could facilitate legal entry, so that men, women and children fleeing war and political oppression can reach Europe safely without having to place their lives in the hands of smugglers. 

The European Union could also abolish or reform the Dublin Regulation that obliges asylum seekers to make their applications in one country only.  This law has placed too much responsibility on European ‘border countries’ like Malta, Italy, Spain and Greece, all of which have experienced surges in irregular migration over the last twenty years.

More generally, Europe could establish an international dialogue with migrant-producing countries to make labour migration safe and mutually beneficial. However, many governments clearly regard ‘Mare Nostrum’ as an essential moat between ‘Fortress Europe’ and its unwanted migrants.

Most migrants who cross the Mediterranean are refugees from nationalities that UNHCR considers to be in need of some form of protection under the terms of the Geneva Convention.   But in order to obtain this, they have to reach Europe first and undergo all the risks that these journeys entail.

All this has transformed the Mediterranean into what Amnesty calls a “survival test” for refugees and migrants. Few politicians will openly admit this because such an admission would directly contradict the values that the European Union has set out to uphold since the European project first took shape after World War II.

Most governments prefer instead to condemn the smugglers and organised criminals who profit from such journeys, and wring their hands whenever a particularly terrible tragedy takes place. Men who sink migrant boats or send them to sea without lifebelts certainly deserve to be condemned.

But, as Amnesty International points out, Europe’s ”woeful response” has also contributed to the death toll.  And it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the Mediterranean has become an instrument in a policy of deterrence, in which migrant deaths are tacitly accepted as a form of ‘collateral damage’ in a militarised response to 21^st century migration whose overriding objective is to stop people coming.

Until these priorities change, migrants will continue to die, and 2014’s grim record may well be superseded.  Italy has already threatened to stop its search and rescue operations when its presidency of the European Union comes to an end later this year.

Amnesty International has urged European governments to fulfil their humanitarian obligations to save lives in the Mediterranean and warned that “the EU as a whole cannot be indifferent to this suffering.”

So far, there is little sign that anybody is listening.

(Edited by Phil Harris)

The author posts blogs on this and other issues at infernalmachine.co.uk/

'The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things'. Painting by Hieronymus Bosch, kept in the Museo del Prado, Madrid

By Roberto Savio
ROME, Jun 9 2014 (IPS)

It is a great pity that, beside opening the doors to ethics, social justice and peace, Pope Francis does not also give indications of updating  traditional theology. The most urgent task is to update the Seven Deadly Sins.

The update should be done on their social impact and viciousness. How it is possible to equate, for example, sloth and gluttony with greed? In the 1987 film Wall Street, Gordon Gekko, a wealthy, unscrupulous corporate raider played by Michael Douglas, says that greed, not gluttony, moves man. And it is very doubtful that all the people who are now moved by greed are also victims of gluttony, when they usually are on a diet!

Roberto Savio. Credit: IPS

According to the United Nations, throughout the world there are over 1.5 billion people who are obese or overweight compared with 842 million who suffer from undernourishment. The problem is that the obese or overweight are not usually the result of overfeeding but of junk food marketing by large corporations (McDonald’s and the like) – and the poor are the most overweight because junk food is cheap.

And sloth is certainly not a social threat, even if urban legend has it that people are poor because they do not want to work.

So, let us concentrate on greed, and see why it is time for an update.“We are rushing forward to the past, and the times of Queen Victoria, when an obscure German philosopher and economist by the name of Karl Marx was working … on his denunciation of exploitation, and preparing his Communist Manifesto”

We have reached a point where the preachers of ethics are central bankers. Speaking last week in London at the Conference on Inclusive Capitalism, Christine Lagarde, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), said that ”some prominent firms have even been mired in scandals that violate the most basic ethical norms.” And Bank of England Governor Mark Carney warned that “unbridled faith in financial markets” before the crisis, rising inequality and recent “demonstrations of corruption” has damaged “social capital”.

This must have gone down well in the country of understatement. According to Lagarde, the big banks are still being subsidised to the tune of 70 billion dollars in the United States and 300 billion dollars in the Eurozone. And in spite of this, regulators around the world have imposed 5.8 billion dollars in penalties for attempting to manipulate market benchmark rates.

Mark Carney solemnly told the London conference: “Ultimately … integrity can neither be bought nor regulated. Even with the best possible framework of codes, principles, compensation schemes and market discipline, financiers must constantly challenge themselves to the standards they uphold.”

And this is exactly the problem. James Dimon, the head of JP Morgan, the world’s largest bank, and with a 74 percent raise in salary for 2013, considers regulations “un-American”. In 2013, the bank paid 18.6 billion dollars in fines. The U.S. Attorney General, Eric Holder, has just slapped a 2.6 billion dollar fine on Credit Suisse for helping U.S. citizens to evade taxes. In December 2013, the European Commission levied fines totalling 1.04 billion euros (1.42 billion dollars) on Barclays, Deutsche Bank, RBS and Société Générale for having manipulated the Euribor benchmark interest rate. Are we therefore to think that this is “un-European”?

It is worth noting that, in this orgy of fines, none of those bankers responsible ever went to jail. They just received salary increase, as the case of James Dimon shows. Banks are inanimate objects, they cannot go to jail. The U.S. Justice Department has gone to great lengths to guarantee that banks will not be treated like criminals because banks cannot be put out of business. These are “the standards they uphold”.

A new contribution to theology has been revealed in Stress Test: Reflections on Financial Crises, a recently published book by Timothy Geithner, President of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and U.S. Treasury Secretary during the 2007-2009 crisis. Writing in the Financial Times of May 28, Martin Wolf says: “Mr. Geithner argues not only that crises are sure to recur but that governments must react with overwhelming force … the government must borrow more, spend more and expose taxpayers to more short-term risk – ‘even if it seems to reward incompetence and venality, even if it fuels perceptions of an out-of-control, money-spewing, bailout-crazed big government’.”

But Geithner “also offers a law of unintended consequences. The safer the visible financial system is made, he argues, the greater the danger that the fragility will emerge somewhere less visible, but possibly even more dangerous.” So the new theology of the financial system is that because it is impossible to make it safe, let us not introduce regulations which, Geithner says, “often be self-defeating.”

Yet, until 1999, when then U.S. President Bill Clinton (culminating a process started by Ronald Reagan) repealed the Glass-Steagall Act which had separated commercial and investment banking for seven decades, we had nothing of what we see today.

Deposit banks were obliged to use citizens’ funds under tight regulations, and the money they raised through deposits was used to finance commercial and capital growth. Now, all the money goes into speculation, and as everybody knows, banks have little patience with small investors and citizens because returns are much smaller than from the various instruments of financial speculation. If anything goes wrong, states are obliged to bail the banks out.

Where does this logic lead? Obviously into taking many risks (the higher, the better return), taking home the highest possible salaries, and knowing that the collectivity is there to bail you out when needed. Clearly, this logic could not exist, if it was not as a shining daughter of greed.

It is a sign of the times that in her speech in London, Lagarde used the same language that Oxfam used at this year’s World Economic Forum in Davos. She reminded the audience that “the 85 richest people in the world, who could fit into a single London double-decker, control as much wealth as the poorest half of the global population– that is 3.5 billion people.”

Now, we know from French economist Thomas Piketty, author of the best-selling book Capital_in_the_Twenty-First_Century, that the growth of this concentration of capital is faster than that of general growth, which is a way to say that these 85 people will continue to suck money from the general market, and therefore the rich will become richer and the poor will become poorer.

In other words, what we are witnessing is a progressive reduction of the middle class, while we are rushing forward to the past, and the times of Queen Victoria, when an obscure German philosopher and economist by the name of Karl Marx was working in the British Library in London on his denunciation of exploitation, and preparing his Communist Manifesto.

This trend is happening everywhere, and at every level. The increase in sales of giant U.S. retailer Walmart fell from 5 percent in 2012 to just 1.6 percent last year. Under Walmart’s pay plan, pay increases would only take effect after growth of 2 percent. So what did its brilliant accountants come up with? They took into in consideration only certain items, making sure to come up with a figure of 2.02 percent growth, permitting William S. Simon, president and chief executive officer of Walmart U.S. to receive a salary increase of 1 million dollars, taking his total salary to 13 million dollars. Meanwhile, the average full-time Walmart employee makes 27,000 dollars a year.

Worse still is the case of restaurants chains, which are setting up a strong line of attack to U.S. President Barack Obama’s idea of raising minimum wages (just like they did in Germany). Ever heard of a chain called Chipotle Mexican Grill? Even if you have, the odds are that you did not know that last year, Steve Ellis, its co-chief executive officer, made 25.1 million dollars while the other co-chief executive officer, Montgomery Moran, made another 24.4 million dollars. As you can see, they make even more than James Dimon.

The average salary at one of Chipotle Mexican Grill’s 1,600 restaurants is 21,000 dollars. Therefore, one employee with this salary would have to work for more than a thousand years to equal one year of the co-chief executive officer’s salaries.

By the way, Mr. Ellis has received more than 145 million dollars in Chipotle stocks since 2011, and Mr. Moran at least 104.5 million.

Now, is it possible that it is the gluttony of Mr. Ellis and Mr. Moran that creates such a world of absurd inequalities? No, but greed certainly does.

Time to update the Seven Deadly Sins, Pope Francis … (END/COLUMNIST SERVICE)

Excerpt:

By Roberto Savio
SAN SALVADOR, Bahamas , Dec 27 2013 (Columnist Service)

At this time of hope for what the new year may bring, it would be useful to look at the legacy we carry with us from the year we leave behind. It was a year full of events – wars, rising social inequality, unchecked finance, the decline of political institutions, and the erosion of global governance.

Perhaps this is nothing new, since these trends have been with us for a long time. But some events have a deeper, longer-lasting impact. And here we will present them briefly, as a list to remember and to watch. They are not offered in order of magnitude, which is always a subjective decision.

Roberto Savio. Credit: IPS

1. Collapse of the Arab Spring. The situations in Egypt and Syria have discouraged other Arab countries from following in their footsteps. The internal struggles in the large and variegated world of Islam will take a long time to settle. The real challenge is how modernism can be used as an element making Islam viable.

The coup in Egypt has given new strength to the radicals who do not believe in democracy, and we will never know if the Muslim Brotherhood could have run the country effectively, or if it would have failed (as is most likely). Outsiders cannot solve this conflict, as the case of Syria, which has become a proxy war financed by external players, clearly shows.

2. U.S. self-sufficiency in energy. In five years the exploitation of shale oil and gas will cut American oil imports in half, and if this trend continues the U.S. could actually become self-sufficient in energy supplies. The impact on the price of oil is clear, and this will affect the strategic importance of the Arab world and petrodollar countries like Russia. American industry will receive a strong boost, but incentives for the development of renewable energy will decline worldwide.

3. The inability to reach a meaningful agreement on climate change. The failure of the last climate change conference in Poland demonstrates that there is little political will to reach a global consensus on ways to tackle this issue. Yet according to most climate scientists we are fast approaching the point of no return, with the prospect of irreversible damage to the global ecosystem.

Meanwhile, French investors are buying land in the south of England to grow vineyards. And Iceland is besieged by investors (including the Chinese), who want to get their hands on a large land area where cultivation will continue to be possible. And all nations are gearing up for the exploitation of mineral reserves under the melting Arctic ice, which is also opening up new avenues for marine transportation.

This shows that the business world has a clearer appreciation of what is happening than governments. But it also shows a lack of vision of social responsibility.

4. U.S. decline. President Barack Obama had to cancel his participation in the recent Asian summit because of the U.S. budget crisis. But Russian President Vladimir Putin was able to attend, and he has managed to successfully manipulate events in Syria.

Obama’s signature healthcare reform is in jeopardy, and Edward Snowden has shown the world that the U.S. does not respect its own allies. Meanwhile, the Tea Party has been able to paralyse the U.S. government and bring the Republication Party to espouse a policy of public sector decline.

People all over the world now consider the U.S. an unreliable partner, in an irreversible crisis, with a president who makes a lot of high-sounding promises but is unable to bring them about.

Nobody has managed to bring the financial sector under control, and scandals and gigantic penalties are a continuing reality. There is no solution in sight on Palestine, and the U.S. is facing great difficulties extricating itself from Afghanistan, while Iraq is reverting to chaos, and the talks with Iran are giving a strong boost to the radical Shia section of the Islamic world. The U.S. is a country of great resilience, but the future does not look at all promising.

5. European decline. The past year was one of disunity in Europe, and the definitive ascendancy of Germany in European affairs. Only macroeconomics counts today. Ireland is held up as an example, after it brought its deficit under control. But at the microeconomic level, the damage to the social fabric can be dramatic.

The same is happening in Portugal, and Greece is the most extreme example. Greeks have lost 20 percent of their income, unemployment has climbed to 27 percent, and more cuts are being demanded.

This is not the place for an analysis of how Germany is helped by its policy, which undercuts others without any hint of solidarity. But in the May 2014 European elections, people are likely to vote in large numbers for the anti-Europe parties, which have sprouted almost everywhere, with the sole exception of Spain. The Spanish government of Mariano Rajoy, as the harsh laws on abortion and public order show, is far enough to the right to leave space to a more right-wing party.

The weakening of the European Parliament will be with us for a long time, until Europe recovers some of the appeal that it has been steadily losing among its citizens.

6. Chinese nationalism. The new president, Xi Jinping, has in a few months assumed an authority unprecedented since the time of Mao Zedong and Deng Xiaoping. He is pushing the idea of a Chinese dream, to galvanise people under his leadership. This is based on the assertion of China as a great power commanding respect around the world.

And bold steps have been taken to affirm Chinese territorial claims that have opened up conflicts with South Korea, the Philippines, Vietnam and Japan. With the Japanese government now run by nationalist politicians, many analysts are considering the possibility of a third world war beginning in Asia.

In the 16th century China had 50 percent of world GNP, and there is a strong desire among the Chinese to regain their “rightful” place in the world. The defence treaty between Japan and the United States makes this a potentially global point of conflict.

7. Changes in the Vatican. The election of Pope Francis has brought a much-needed change of direction in the Catholic Church. The Pope is binging back a focus on people rather than the market, using terms like “solidarity”, “social justice”, “exclusion” and “marginalisation”, which until recently had all but disappeared from political discourse.

President Obama has followed with a strong speech against the growing social inequalities in the U.S.

And according to the London School of Economics, in 20 years Britain will return to the level of social inequality it experienced during the times of Queen Victoria.

But Pope Francis is the only one denouncing the dismantling of the welfare system which emerged during the Cold War. Let us hope that his call will help prevent the writing of a new Das Kapital, where the victims will not be workers, but young people.

Excerpt:

Analysts wonder how solid are the changes in the Catholic Church, referred to by Pope Francis. Credit: Fabiana Frayssinet/IPS

By Fabiana Frayssinet
RIO DE JANEIRO, Aug 1 2013 (IPS)

“The rivalry between our countries is over: if the pope is Argentine then God is Brazilian,” Francis joked when journalists asked him why he was so beloved in this country, where millions came out to see him, despite the historic football rivalry between South America’s two giants.

Meanwhile, religious analysts wonder how far the Catholic Church is willing to “negotiate”, as an institution, on taboo issues like the ordination of women as priests, the integration of divorced and remarried Catholics, and the rejection of homosexuals.

Pope Francis – formerly Argentine bishop Jorge Bergoglio – was especially careful to leave those issues off the agenda of the Jul. 22-28 events of World Youth Day, which drew him to Brazil.

Reading between the lines, many saw his responses to reporters on the plane that took him back to the Vatican as signs of a “revolution” from the pope who comes from the land of legendary revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara. Or at least as a sign of a new openness on the part of the Roman Catholic Church.

“If someone is gay and he searches for the Lord in good faith, who am I to judge? The Catholic Church teaches that gay people should not be discriminated against; they should be made to feel welcome,” Pope Francis said in the press conference.

But he went on to condemn the “gay lobby,” saying ”I think that when we encounter a gay person, we must make the distinction between the fact of a person being gay and the fact of a lobby, because lobbies are not good.”

Frei Betto, a Brazilian writer, theologian and Dominican friar, told IPS that the pope was a leader willing to make concessions, a man of dialogue rather than discipline. “We no longer have a conservative pope, like the two who preceded him,” he said.

But they are concessions, not revolutions, said sociologist Luiz Alberto Gomes de Souza, director of the Science and Religion Programme at the private Cándido Mendes University in Rio de Janeiro.

The sociologist doesn’t see the Argentine pope as a “rebel” who has come to the Vatican to change the Church’s doctrine.

“I would say the pope won’t change the traditional doctrine on a series of issues, but that yes, by avoiding a full-on condemnation, to a certain degree he has emitted a liberating silence. In other words, a silence that allows these issues to begin to be discussed,” Gomes de Souza told IPS.

But the bishop of Rome – as Francis prefers to call himself, as part of the no-frills style he has brought to the papacy – closed the door on other issues like abortion or same-sex marriage, to which he was staunchly opposed as a cardinal in Argentina.

“On the ordination of women, the church has spoken and said no,” Francis said on the plane. “John Paul II definitively said that door is closed.”

The pope also specifically confirmed church teachings on abortion, saying “you know perfectly the Church’s position”.

Nevertheless, Gomes de Souza said Francis had opened another door: to a new “climate” favourable to debate on questions that had been “frozen,” such as mandatory celibacy for priests, sexual morals, chastity among the young, the condemnation of birth control methods, and sexual diversity.

“People (in the Church) were afraid to discuss these questions,” the expert said. “Now, to a certain degree, he has thawed the freeze surrounding them.”

Frei Betto said: “He will not close the debate within the Church on issues of moral theology that have been frozen since the 16th century, and that theologians could not address without running the risk of censure or sanctions.”

The pope did not refer to the questions in regard to which debate has been “frozen”. But he did address other hot issues tackled by the journalists on the plane, such as divorce or the participation of women in the Catholic Church.

“I believe this is a time of mercy…In terms of communion for those who have divorced and remarried, it has to be seen within the larger pastoral context of marriage. When the council of eight cardinals meets Oct. 1-3, one of the things they’ll consider is how to move forward with the pastoral care of marriage,” Francis said, referring to the demand that Catholics who remarry after divorce be allowed to take communion.

He also left open the question of reforming the process for annulling marriages.

In addition, he opened a door for women. “A church without women would be like the apostolic college without Mary…we don’t yet have a truly deep theology of women in the Church,” he said.

Paulo Carneiro de Andrade at the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro described the new climate in the Church as “optimistic,” not because of a “change in doctrine, but in the pastoral relationship.”

A climate that is necessary in a Catholic Church that is losing ground to evangelical groups with more festive rituals and preachers who are closer to their flock.

What changed, according to Carneiro de Andrade, was “the pastoral context in which we are now speaking.” Like Gomes de Souza, the theologian said there was no “innovation” in issues like the integration of gays in society and the condemnation of homophobia – or the integration of divorced and remarried Catholics, which had already been discussed during the time of Francis’ predecessor, Benedict XVI.

“It comes as a surprise because the tone used to be negative, one of condemnation, of distrust towards the modern world,” Carneiro de Andrade told IPS. “This pope shows a more positive and constructive vision of the Christian faith. That’s why what he says takes on another dimension.”

A new dimension carefully interwoven in the choice of a new pope.

He is “a necessary pope, who was selected due to Benedict’s resignation and admission that he could not handle the problems that the Church was facing,” Frei Betto said.

In an interview with Brazil’s Globo TV station that aired Jul. 27, “Francis made it clear that the cardinals at the conclave had agreed to choose someone who was capable of transforming the Church,” he said.

Carneiro de Andrade said they were looking for a more proactive pope, with a more optimistic view of the future.

The attitude of Francis, all smiles and jokes in Rio de Janeiro, pointed the way. Which, compared to Benedict’s ever stern, serious expression, is indeed a revolution.

By Fabiana Frayssinet
RIO DE JANEIRO, Jul 30 2013 (IPS)

At odds since colonial times, Catholicism and Afro-Brazilian religions have embarked on a process of mutual acceptance. Pope Francis added words and gestures to this reconciliation of two groups that share a common interest: confronting the growth of evangelical and neo-Pentecostal churches.

The photo of Francis wearing a “cocar” headdress given to him by Ubiraí, a Pataxó Indian, went around the world.

Ivanir dos Santos, a “babalawo” or priest of the Afro-Brazilian candomblé religion, was also received by the pope in the Municipal Theatre of Rio de Janeiro as part of the rapprochement between the Catholic Church and other creeds and cultures during his Jul. 22-28 visit to Brazil.

“For the first time, a representative of candomblé was received by a pope. This is unprecedented,” dos Santos, a member of Brazil’s Committee Against Religious Intolerance (CCIR), told IPS.“When the pope stands up for the secular state, which guarantees religious freedom and prevents persecution, he is being very pragmatic." -- Maria Celina D'Araujo

“It was a very important step. It marked a gesture of respect for Afro-Brazilian and minority religions,” he said.

That day, the pope called for inter-religious dialogue and surprised politicians, among other invited guests, with a declaration in favour of the secular state.

“Peaceful coexistence between different religions is favoured by the laicity of the state, which, without assuming any one confessional stance, respects and values the presence of the religious factor in society,” he said.

Francis probably had two audiences in mind, according to political analyst Maria Celina D’Araujo, a professor in the social sciences department at the Pontifical Catholic University in Rio de Janeiro.

On the one hand, “the most fundamentalist Islamic sectors, Islamic theocratic states, where Christians and the Catholic Church have been persecuted, as in Egypt,” D’Araujo told IPS.

But on the other hand, the message was also for Latin America, particularly Brazil, where “evangelical fundamentalism is growing and has strong political participation,” she said.

Francis chose Brazil for his first overseas visit as pope, taking part in the week-long World Youth Day event for young people organised by the Catholic Church.

In a survey by the Datafolha polling firm on the eve of Francis’ arrival, 57 percent of respondents declared themselves Catholics, compared to the 64 percent who identified themselves that way in 2007, when his predecessor Benedict XVI (2005-2013) visited the country.

The proportion of interviewees describing themselves as Pentecostal evangelicals, meanwhile, rose from 17 to 19 percent, while non-Pentecostal Protestants increased from five to nine percent.

A similar phenomenon is occurring in other parts of Latin America, although Catholicism remains the dominant faith.

Evangelical and neo-Pentecostal denominations have also grown in terms of political influence. D’Araujo estimates evangelical forces in Congress at 30 percent, holding decisive sway over congressional votes to do with reproductive rights, sexual minorities or the decriminalisation of abortion.

“When the pope stands up for the secular state, which guarantees religious freedom and prevents persecution, he is being very pragmatic. The Catholic Church knows it is losing ground, and will not be able to grow with fundamentalist, intolerant parties in power,” the analyst said.

A meeting ahead of World Youth Day shed light on the Catholic position on religious freedom and diversity.

At the “terreiro” (temple) of Axé Bamgbosè, in the municipality of Duque de Caxias, candomblé priests including dos Santos gathered with Jesuit priests, seminarians and young people from different parts of the world.

At the meeting, which IPS attended, the Jesuits heard theological explanations about candomblé from representatives of this religion brought to Brazil from West Africa by slaves, and repressed during colonial times by the Jesuit order, to which Francis belonged until he became pope.

The Catholics visited the shrines of the “orixás” or minor gods or spirits, and even watched a ceremony of African origins.

“For me, as for others, this discovery of religions, other creeds and viewpoints, other spiritualities, is a new thing. Probably 50 or 60 years ago they were hidden or forbidden. When the Americas were colonised, they were also banned and denied,” Sergio Montes, a Jesuit from Bolivia who took part in the ceremony, told IPS.

In Brazil, followers of African religions like candomblé or umbanda were persecuted, often violently, down the centuries, until a law permitting police repression of their ceremonies was repealed in 1970.

Today Afro-Brazilian religions are still persecuted, but by the neo-Pentecostal churches that call them “satanic cults”. Catholicism is also attacked by the same groups.

“The neo-Pentecostals do not respect different beliefs; they think they own the truth, they talk as if God speaks only to them. That is fascism. We cannot generalise, but many of these segments are very bad for democracy in Latin America and Brazil,” dos Santos said.

The Catholic Church’s openness is not entirely new. “The Society of Jesus throughout its history has been opening doors in what we now call inter-religious dialogue,” Montes said.

He cited, for example, the Jesuit missions in what are now Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil and Paraguay, as well as the order’s historical ties with China.

“For the Society of Jesus this is not a novelty, although the context is new,” he said.

Montes said this is a propitious time to put into practice guidelines that were proposed at the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965) and that “are beginning to take shape.”

Inter-cultural and inter-religious dialogue have advanced in Latin America since then, especially at the episcopal conferences at Medellín, Colombia (1968), Puebla, Mexico (1979), Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic (1992) and Aparecida, Brazil (2007).

“Much emphasis has been placed on the possibility of getting to know and recognise each other, respecting rather than only tolerating each other, with a powerful vision of the fact that what is important is the humanity that unites us,” said Montes.

“Pope Francis has opened a very important door not only for the Church, but also for all religions and for the whole of humanity,” he said.

Dos Santos agreed. “It is time to unite in respect for diversity and against intolerance,” he said.

And from a religious viewpoint, the babalawo said he had hope.

“Not only the world changes. Religions must change too. And I think we are seeing new signs now,” he said.

"The loss of Catholics is related to the conservatism of the Church. But the mere presence of Francis, his cheerfulness and charisma, will have an effect." - Sociologist Ivo Lesbaupin

By Fabíola Ortiz
RIO DE JANEIRO, Jul 29 2013 (IPS)

Pope Francis’ first overseas trip, to Brazil, the country with the largest number of Catholics in the world, was marked with setbacks, disorganisation and lack of infrastructure for an event that brought half a million pilgrims to the city of Rio de Janeiro.

The pope attended World Youth Day events held Monday Jul. 22 to Sunday Jul. 28 in Rio, where most of the religious ceremonies took place in well-known locations like the statue of Christ the Redeemer, the Metropolitan Cathedral and a park at Copacabana beach, the site of the inaugural masses and the Stations of the Cross.

The Jesuit former president of the Pontifical Catholic University, Jesús Hortal, admitted to IPS that during the preparations for World Youth Day, he had realised that the logistics would be “a big problem.”

“Our infrastructure is not up to scratch. We don’t have express buses, airports or transport facilities, and the metro is a joke,” said Hortal, who knew the Argentine pope, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, when he was archbishop of Buenos Aires."The loss of Catholics is related to the conservatism of the Church. But the mere presence of Francis, his cheerfulness and charisma, will have an effect." - Sociologist Ivo Lesbaupin

Getting around the city was very difficult for the tens of thousands of visitors from all over the world who spent hours stranded in crowded metro stations trying to get to Copacabana.

Roads were closed in the famous Rio neighbourhood, blocking buses and forcing the faithful to walk for kilometres or to face the power outages that interrupted the metro, the only means of transport to reach the main scenario of the Catholic celebrations.

Every day long lines of people waited to take the metro, causing the stations to overflow and crowding the streets of Copacabana.

“Are you a journalist? Then report on this absurd situation; nowhere in the world is the metro as bad as this,” one Brazilian pilgrim said crossly.

The week-long celebrations surrounding World Youth Day were not only hard on the faithful, who also had to put up with cold, rainy weather, unusual in this tropical city.

Francis was taken by surprise too.

When he arrived in Rio, his motorcade was caught in a traffic jam of buses on one of the main avenues. The news spread quickly that the pope was trapped in traffic, and tens of thousand of faithful surrounded his vehicle, trying to catch a glimpse of him.

The first Latin American pope in the history of the Roman Catholic Church came to Brazil at a time when the country has for weeks been shaken by social unrest. Young people have been protesting in dozens of cities since early June, demanding political and social change.

It was fortunate that the pope should arrive at this time, sociologist Ivo Lesbaupin of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro told IPS.

“The demonstrations put two million people on the streets, young people demanding their rights, calling for changes, reacting against a way of doing politics…that is separate and removed from society,” he said.

Three protests took place during Francis’ visit, which ended Sunday Jul. 28. First, a few hundred people gathered on Monday Jul. 22 in front of Guanabara palace, the seat of the state government, where leftwing President Dilma Rousseff, her ministers and hundreds of politicians and prelates were welcoming the pope.

Outside the palace the police isolated the demonstrators and put down the protest. Six demonstrators were injured and three were arrested.

On Friday Jul. 26, another protest was held close to the Copacabana beachfront promenade, where the Stations of the Cross were being re-enacted. The demonstrators complained that the papal visit and World Youth Day cost 53 million dollars. The police dispersed them with water cannons and tear gas.

“It was clear that the protests were not going to suddenly end, and with the presence of the pope and so many media outlets, it was very likely that some demonstrations would be organised,” Lesbaupin said.

Hortal said he felt nervous when people began to gather in front of the state government house, on Francis’ first night in Rio.

“It was young people complaining about the way politics are done in Brazil. The main question is corruption; politicians are not in a very good situation. People were there to protest against the governor, but some might also have protested against the pope, and some of the crowd were violent,” he said.

The priest was afraid violent acts might interrupt the religious celebrations.

According to Lesbaupin, the demonstrators wanted a word of support from the pope.

“He gave signs of support to the young people’s demands, we saw it subliminally. Speaking to the politicians, he communicated confidence in young people as the window to the future,” the sociologist said.

In his homilies and speeches in the favela or shantytown of Manguinhos and a hospital for people with drug problems, Francis emphasised the ideas of fraternity, community and social justice.

The pope called on young people to fight against injustice and “never be discouraged” by corruption. In reference to the local policy of pacification of the favelas, he said it would only be possible when efforts were made to integrate the poor areas surrounding the cities.

Lauro Condiran, a 30-year-old pilgrim from Brasilia, hoped that Francis would manage to bring government representatives together to listen to the people.

“The people want health, security and education. The pope will not remain neutral in the face of this situation,” he told IPS.

Hortal recalled that World Youth Days have several times in the past been the scenario of demonstrations, because of their international dimension, such as in Germany in 2005, Australia in 2008 and Spain in 2011.

“There are groups that protest against the government. That happened in Madrid, in Cologne and in Sydney. There are always some people who express their problems,” said the Jesuit.

While social agitation grows in Brazil, Catholicism is losing adherents, many of whom are switching to evangelical churches.

According to the most recent census by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics, in 2010, out of the population of 190 million that year, 64.6 percent described themselves as Catholics – almost 123 million people. But in 1970 the proportion was 91.8 percent.

The proportion of evangelical Christians, meanwhile, climbed from 5.2 percent of the population in 1970 to 22.2 percent – or 42.3 million people – in 2010.

The state of Rio de Janeiro is the least religious of all. Less than half of the population declare themselves Catholic, and over 15 percent say they have no religion at all.

In Lesbaupin’s view, the pope does not appear to be very concerned with attracting new adherents.

“The loss of Catholics is related to the conservatism of the Church in recent decades, and its lack of openness to young people. But the mere presence of Francis, his cheerfulness and charisma, will have an effect,” said the sociologist.

By Fabíola Ortiz
RIO DE JANEIRO, Jun 27 2013 (IPS)

The Catholic Church has become sclerotic and is afraid of facing the issues of post-modernity, Brazilian theologian Frei Betto says, although he hopes that Francis, the first Latin American pope, will inspire it to renew its emphasis on social issues and the defence of the poor.

Carlos Alberto Libânio Christo, known as Frei Betto, hopes that Pope Francis will encourage young people to dream again, commit themselves to social issues and believe in utopias, when he visits Brazil Jul. 22-29.

Liberation theology exponent Frei Betto, during the interview. Credit: Fabíola Ortiz/IPS

Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the archbishop of Buenos Aires until he assumed the papacy on Mar. 13, will undertake his first international journey to lead the 28th World Youth Day, to be held in Rio de Janeiro Jul. 23-28.

In this interview with IPS, Frei Betto, a Dominican friar who was a special adviser to leftwing former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (2003-2011) in the early years of his mandate, called on Brazilian authorities to enter into “face-to-face” dialogue with social movements and listen to their demands, without empty words and hollow promises.

The author of more than 56 books and the winner of major literary prizes and awards for defending human rights, Frei Betto has just published a new work, “O que a vida me ensinou” (What Life Has Taught Me).

Q: What has life taught you?

A: The particular thing about this book is the autobiographical stories that I had never made public before, like my sharing in the last days of Tancredo Neves (the first president elected after the 1964-1985 dictatorship, who died before taking office), or how I looked after my father, who was chemically dependent.

In the book I also tell how I dealt with an attempted bribery, when I was offered a chance to make two million dollars, and I devote three chapters to my current views on spirituality.

Q: As an exponent of liberation theology, what role would you say this school of thought played in Latin American Catholicism?

A: I don’t think it should be consigned to the past. Liberation theology still plays an important role in the Latin American Catholic Church, especially in and through basic Christian communities, Bible reading groups, and meetings like the forthcoming National Conference on Faith and Politics in Brasilia in November.

I believe, moreover, that this school of thought has compelled papal discourse on social affairs to change. Recently pontiffs have been more forceful about these issues, shown by the criticisms of neoliberalism voiced by John Paul II and Benedict XVI, or on the positive side, the visits they both made to Cuba.

Q: How do you interpret Benedict XVI’s resignation and the election, for the first time, of a Latin American, Francis, to succeed him, rather than a European?

A: Resigning was an act of evangelical humility on the part of Benedict XVI, when no other pope had taken such a step for centuries.

I am very hopeful about the pontificate of pope “Chico Bento” (as Francis is popularly known, in reference to a rustic character created by Brazilian comic book artist Mauricio de Sousa), because he is Latin American. He is open to social questions and, above all, committed to defending the rights of the poor.

The fact that he adopted the name of Francis of Assisi, the most beloved saint in Christian history, admired for his evangelical poverty, says a great deal. I look forward to the 12 speeches he is due to give at the World Youth Day celebrations.

Q: Do you think a reform of the Catholic Church is possible? What, in your view, are the most sensitive challenges the church faces?

A: Pope Chico Bento will have to open up debate within the Catholic Church on urgent, burning issues that have long been kept on ice: an end to mandatory celibacy, ordination of women to the priesthood, condom use, biogenetics and the reform of the Roman Curia.

Q: World Youth Day will be Francis’ international debut. What are your expectations for this event?

A: I hope that the Youth Day, through the pope’s words and gestures, will bring hope to young people and encourage them to commit themselves to a world of justice, freedom and peace. I am convinced that the more utopian they are, the less they will turn to drugs, as in my generation, which was 20 years old in the 1960s.

And the less utopian, as in our present “globo-colonised” world, the more the drug use. Nowadays young people have no dreams.

Q: Do you think World Youth Day will be a call on the Church to renew itself, in order to counteract the loss or apathy of the faithful?

A: Yes, the Catholic Church has become sclerotic for fear of facing the issues of post-modernity, like those related to faith and science, social inequality, the new sexual profiles and gender relations.

Q: You were very close to Lula. From that viewpoint, what is your analysis of his successor, President Dilma Rousseff? Do you think that the governing Workers’ Party (PT) has changed course?

A: I regret that the PT has turned its project for Brazil into a project for power. However, I think the governments of Lula and Dilma are the best we have had in our history as a republic. Structural reforms are needed – land reform, political reform and so on – and better communication with the party’s base, the social movements.

Q: What do you think of the president’s handling of the numerous conflicts and social protests that have taken over the main cities?

A: She has shown lack of determination, timidity and a fear of displeasing the most reactionary members of her alliance and the barons of agribusiness. The PT has distanced itself from its social base, the movements that mobilise hope, and now it is in danger of falling victim to them.

The only way out for the government is to enter into face-to-face dialogue with these social movements, without empty words and hollow promises, and for the PT to return to working with its base, together with the oppressed and excluded sectors of the population.

The government is doing well in the distribution of income, and badly in the distribution of ‘political dividends.’ There is no dialogue with grassroots leadership, no progress on the demarcation of indigenous people’s territories or on land reform, nor is there consultation, as the constitution requires, of indigenous peoples about the construction of large projects in their territories.

Q: What is your view on the ongoing social protests, which were originally about public transport fare increases and then flared up because of harsh police crackdowns in Rio, São Paulo and other cities?

A: This is a new phenomenon. Analysts still haven’t realised it, but it’s enough to be linked to the social networking sites to feel the mobilisation, through information or the street demonstrations themselves. These protests confirm that our governments are very much distanced from the social movements and organised youth, especially the São Paulo government and the federal government.

Excerpt:

Jorge Bergoglio begins his papacy as Francis I facing the challenge of a Catholic Church caught up in a burdensome contradiction with modern society, because of its negative attitude to sexuality and women.

“There would be much more common sense, efficiency and tenderness in the church, rather than that immense wave of paedophilia and paederasty in the hierarchy and the Catholic schools” if the Catholic Church had incorporated women into the priesthood and the different leadership roles in the institution, said João Tavares, a married former priest living in São Luis, in northeastern Brazil.

Women, who are “the real pillar of Christian communities,” can no longer remain without equal rights within the church, “as if they were second-class human beings,” he said in an interview with IPS.

As well as being excluded from the hierarchy, a woman cannot even become the partner of a priest without invalidating his ministry, unless they both live a secret, hypocritical life. In practice, women are depicted by the church as a contagious source of sin.

The Catholic Church is characterised by androcentrism, excluding women from its decisions and the performance of its celebrations, although they are the majority of the faithful and the greatest “consumers of spiritual goods,” complained Regina Jurkewicz, one of the coordinators of Católicas pelo Direito de Decidir (CDD – a partner of the U.S.-based Catholics for Choice) in Brazil.

The church’s discrimination against women contrasts with other faiths, such as Afro-Brazilian religions which have male and female priests and priestesses, or Buddhists, who admit women monks, or Anglicans who have women bishops, Jurkewicz, who holds a doctorate in sociology of religion, told IPS.

The clash with reality is even more marked because Catholicism predominates in some regions where women have made great progress in terms of their rights.

CDD is a Latin American network formed in 1996 in association with Catholics for Choice. “We fight for changes in the cultural patterns that restrict the autonomy of persons in our societies, especially women,” the network says on its web page.

The Brazilian branch emerged in 1993, and one of its founders was Jurkewicz, who was active in social pastoral work from a young age. In the early 1990s she encountered feminist ideas and joined other activists in discussing the role of women in the Catholic Church.

The conferences organised by the United Nations in the 1990s, including the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995, were important for the development of concepts like sexual and reproductive rights, in spite of opposition from the Vatican, Jurkewicz said.

With “such blinkered sexual morality and such blindness to reality,” the Catholic Church remains a hurdle to progress on these rights and is sliding backwards, she said. The hierarchy continues to reject condom use, contraceptives, abortion, same-sex couples and married priests.

“One consequence of Rome’s imposition of this line is loss of the faithful. Brazil, and other Latin American nations, can no longer call themselves ‘Catholic countries,’ when new religions are springing up like mushrooms,” she said.

The decline in the number of Catholics must have been one of the factors that led to the election of Bergoglio of Argentina, the first Latin American pope, Jurkewicz said.

But in spite of the strides made by evangelical faiths, the region still has a Catholic majority. And unlike in Europe, there is a high level of participation by young people – a decisive factor for the future of the church.

But it is difficult to maintain youth participation levels when running counter to public opinion. A survey carried out by the Datafolha Institute on Mar. 20-21 found that 93 percent of Catholic respondents were in favour of condom use, 64 percent thought that women should be able to celebrate mass, and 51 percent approved of priests marrying and having families.

The poll also found slightly lower percentages saying the new pope should lead the Catholic Church down these paths favoured by the majority. For instance, 58 percent of those surveyed wanted the Vatican to support women in the priesthood, and 48 percent wanted official support for married priests, while 41 percent were against.

Furthermore, 87 percent of respondents from the general population, and 86 percent of Catholics, believed that some priests were involved in paedophilia and sexual abuse.

But the obligation of priestly celibacy “was never a dogma and has no natural, biblical, philosophical or theological foundation; it was a sorry invention of the Catholic Church hierarchy,” said Tavares, in charge of communications for the Movimento Nacional das Famílias dos Padres Casados (MFPC – National Movement of Families of Married Priests).

Questions of “organisation and power,” because it’s harder to control priests who have wives and children, and of economics, because of savings on family support, are behind the rule of celibacy adopted in the 11th century, according to Tavares, who was married in 1979 to Sofía, a philosopher and theologian.

“I loved the priesthood very much,” he said, but he left it after years of reflection, dissatisfied with the “humanly impoverished life” and the mentality of a Church that “instead of being light, salt and leaven for the world preferred power, vanity, great cathedrals and the domination of consciences.”

He joined the Movement of Married Priests, which he presided from 2000 to 2002, in a search for shared values. An estimated 5,000 priests in Brazil have got married, like Tavares, who has two daughters and a granddaughter.

The new pope has already made “captivating, engaging gestures,” such as the choice of his name, his simple lifestyle and his vow of poverty, said Tavares. But, he added, Francis has declared his opposition to abortion and same-sex unions, “so not much can be hoped for on these fronts. Only time will tell if there will be any changes,” he said.

But there is “a certain fear of, or even aversion to, sexuality in the Western Catholic hierarchy,” which from its origins has been associated with “Platonism, in which the body is evil and the soul, trapped within it, longs to be freed,” he said. He also alleged that the last two popes had tried to cover up “the tsunami of homosexuality and paedophilia.”

Pope Francis, as a South American, might want to pay attention to “those two serious and urgent problems,” celibacy and the exclusion of women, said Tavares.

Born in Portugal, the former priest has lived since 1967 in the northeastern Brazilian state of Maranhão, first as a missionary in rural areas and later as a professor of philosophy at a public university in the state capital, São Luis.

Jurkewicz, however, said that only a “conversion” like that undergone by Oscar Arnulfo Romero, a conservative turned progressive archbishop in El Salvador who was assassinated in 1980 for his actions on behalf of the poor and human rights, could move Francis to promote major changes in the Church.

Indigenous women fetching water from a well near San Cristóbal de las Casas in the southern Mexican state of Chiapas. Credit: Mauricio Ramos/IPS

By Marcela Valente
BUENOS AIRES, Mar 22 2013 (IPS)

The new pope’s choice of the name Francis, to honour the Catholic Church’s patron saint of animals and the environment, has awakened the hopes of ecologists and others who are concerned about rampant consumerism and the deterioration of the planet.

In 1979, then Pope John Paul II proclaimed St. Francis of Assisi (1181/1182-1226) the patron saint of ecologists. In his first mass as pope, on Mar. 19, Jorge Bergoglio said: “Let us be protectors of creation, protectors of God’s plan inscribed in nature, protectors of one another and of the environment.”

”It’s excellent that a world leader is taking up this issue as a priority,” Diego Moreno, director of the Fundación Vida Silvestre, Argentina’s main wildlife advocacy organisation, told IPS. “With the Church’s ability to reach people, the fact that the environment is part of the pope’s discourse is very important, because it will get more people involved.”

In Latin America and Africa, “environmental problems are closely linked to poverty, with the poor living in areas that are the most vulnerable to climate change and the degradation of the soil,” he said.

But there are also other areas in which the pope “could turn out to be an ally,” Moreno added. For example, excessive consumption – “verging on squander” – has a huge impact on natural resources, he said.

Both environmentalists and bishops in Latin America criticise consumerism and urge people to follow a simpler lifestyle.

The pope’s homily was in line with the recommendations set forth in the final document of the 5th General Conference of the Council of Latin American Bishops in Aparecida, Brazil, in 2007.

Bergoglio, who was an Argentine cardinal before he was elected pope on Mar. 13, presided over the committee that drew up the final conclusions.

The document criticises the extractive industries and agribusiness for failing to respect the economic, social and environmental rights of local communities, and questions the introduction of genetically modified organisms because they do not contribute to the fight against hunger or to sustainable rural development.

The final document also stressed the region’s rich flora and faun and social diversity, defended traditional indigenous know-how that has been “illicitly appropriated” by the pharmaceutical industry, and called for the preservation of the Amazon rainforest as part of “the inheritance we received, for free, to protect.”

The call for the preservation of the environment “is a little-known aspect” of the Aparecida final document, Pablo Canziani, a doctor in physical sciences who is in charge of the environmental area of the department of laypersons in the Argentine bishops’ conference, told IPS.

Environmental issues were not traditionally a concern of the Catholic Church, until they took on importance because of their links with human development, said Canziani, a member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

“It is the poor who suffer the most from climate change, desertification, or the waste of food,” said the scientist, who has served as an adviser to several Vatican delegations to United Nations conferences on poverty, the environment and food.

In Aparecida, the bishops stressed that in Latin America and the Caribbean, nature “is fragile and defenceless in the face of the economic and technological powers.” And they said “the interests of economic groups that irrationally destroy the sources of life” should not be predominant over natural resources.

The final document also called for educating people to live a simple, austere lifestyle based on solidarity, for expanding the pastoral presence in communities threatened by activities that destroy the environment, and for seeking “an alternative development model, based on an ethics that includes ecology.”

John Paul II (1978-2005) was the first to put these issues on the Church agenda, said Luis Scozzina, a priest who is the director of the Franciscan Centre of Studies and Regional Development.

The Centre was created in Argentina’s Catholic University “to contribute to information and research on questions related to the environment,” its web site says.

“Protecting creation” is one of the central focuses of Franciscans, Scozzina told IPS. And he said Bergoglio is “the most Franciscan Jesuit we have ever known,” because besides his intellectual leanings, characteristic of the Jesuits, he leads an austere lifestyle with close ties to the poor, as Franciscans do.

“Francis will put the ecological crisis high up on the agenda. He already indicated that in his mass, when he spoke of protecting three dimensions: ourselves, one another, and creation. By ‘one another’ he meant the poor, who are hurt the most by the consequences of environmental deterioration.”

Father Scozzina added that “even the most optimistic warn that we are moving towards steady destruction, and in response to that, we in the Church are calling for an ethics of austerity, a change in lifestyle that leaves behind this frenzied consumption.”

In Aparecida, he noted, the bishops signalled the need for a change in the production model. “In Latin America, this merits reflection. Are we going to continue with the model of extraction of our natural resources?” he said.

What is the interest of some groups in raising the question of Pope Francis’s past rather than discussing the serious crisis in the Church? asks Leonardo Boff. Credit: Daniela Pastrana/IPS

By Fabiana Frayssinet
RIO DE JANEIRO, Mar 19 2013 (IPS)

Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff, a leading exponent of liberation theology, the progressive current in the Latin American Catholic Church, does not believe reports that depict the new Pope Francis as collaborating with Argentina’s 1976-1983 dictatorship.

In this interview with IPS, Boff acknowledged that it was a “controversial issue,” and that there were contradictory accounts. But he said he believed prominent human rights defenders in Argentina who denied that Archbishop Jorge Bergoglio, elected pope by the Vatican, had any ties with Argentina’s military regime.

Boff, a key figure in liberation theology, which emerged in Latin America in the 1950s and 1960s with a focus on social justice and the poor, said he was looking towards the future with hope and that he was confident that Francis would honour his Jesuit faith and would take a “vigorous and radical” stance against the epidemic of paedophilia and corruption plaguing the Church.

Q: How do you interpret the “decentralisation” that the selection of a Latin American pope implies?

A: The central Church, that is, the Vatican and the European churches, felt humiliated and ashamed by the scandals created within their own walls. So they chose someone from outside, with a different approach and a different style of leading the Church.

Sixty percent of all priests live in the Third World. It was time for those churches to be heard better. They are no longer churches that mirror Europe but are now churches that are a source, with their own face and their own forms of organisation, generally in community networks.

For me, the name Francis is more than a name – it’s a reflection of a poor Church with close ties to the people, evangelical, a lover and protector of nature, which has been devastated. Saint Francis is the archetype of this kind of Church. Pope Francis is inaugurating a Church of the third millennium, far removed from the palaces and with a deep connection to people and their cultures.

Q: To what do you attribute the choice of Bergoglio, instead of Brazilian Cardinal Odilo Scherer?

A: Scherer was the candidate of the Vatican, where he worked and made a lot of friends. But he publicly defended the curia, and the Vatican Bank, which was criticised by many, including many cardinals. That unleashed a public debate, which hurt him. Besides, he would not have been good for the Church at this juncture. He is conservative and authoritarian. He would have been a Benedict XVII.

Q: In Argentina, the election of Bergoglio was criticised because of his supposed complicity in the abduction of two Jesuit priests during the dictatorship.

A: I know that in general the Argentine church was not very prophetic in denouncing state terrorism. Despite that, there were bishops like (Enrique) Angelleli, who died in a shady manner, (Jorge) Novak, (Jaime) De Nevares and Jerónimo Podestá, among others, who were openly critical.

But with regard to Bergoglio, I prefer to believe Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, a Nobel Peace Prize-winner, and a former member of the National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons (Graciela Fernández Meijide), who say that allegation is slanderous. They didn’t find a single mention of Bergoglio’s name on documents or legal accusations.

On the contrary, he saved many people by hiding them in the Colegio Máximo de San
Miguel (Argentina’s main Jesuit training centre). Besides, it runs against his known character – he is strong but also tender, and poor, and he continuously speaks out against social injustice in Argentina and for the need for justice, not philanthropy.

But in the end, what matters isn’t Bergoglio and his past, but Francis and his future.

Q: Why did you omit any reference to this issue in your initial remarks?

A: It’s a controversial issue and you have to be familiar with it. The versions are contradictory. I don’t talk about things that I am not fully clear about. And I have to wonder: what is the interest of some groups in raising this question rather than discussing the serious crisis in the Church…?

Perhaps – I’ll concede this much – he could have been more prophetic, like Bishop Hélder Câmara and Cardinal Paulo Evaristo Arns were in Brazil. But here, the state is secular and separate from the church. In Argentina, Catholicism is the state religion, which hindered but didn’t impede resistance and denunciations by the Church.

Q: Omission isn’t a sin?

A: It isn’t a question of responding whether it is a sin or not…The question is political and for me it’s about what side the person is on – are they on the side of the poor, of those who suffer terrible inequalities? Or of the status quo that wants unlimited growth and a culture of consumption?

Bergoglio took the side of the victims and is constantly calling for social justice. If we don’t understand that, we are getting away from the main point.

Q: You attributed his choice of the name Francis to the “demoralisation” of a “Church in ruins” as a result of various scandals. How should that name be expressed in practice?

A: He has given signs of a different kind of papacy, without symbols of power or privileges. A pope who pays his own hotel bills, drives in a simple car to pray at the basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore, and secretly visits his friend, Cardinal Jorge Mejía, who is ill in Rome…these are gestures that the people understand.

I am sure that with regard to the paedophiles and the financial crimes, he will be more Jesuit than Franciscan, vigorous and radical, because things cannot go on the way they are now in the Church.

Q: The new pope believed he saw the hand of the devil in questions like the decriminalisation of abortion and the legalisation of homosexual marriage in Argentina, and he has confronted the government because of this. Should we expect a pope who is more or equally conservative on these questions of doctrine?

A: These questions are banned by the Vatican. No one could distance himself from the official position. I hope that Francis, as pope, will start a lengthy discussion of all of these issues, because they are a part of the real life of the people and of the new culture that is emerging, especially the question of celibacy and sexual morality.

That doesn’t mean the Church has to renounce its most deeply-held positions, but that it should debate things within a context of democracy, and should respect what is decided in a democratic fashion. The good thing about democracy is that it impedes top-down decisions from being imposed and allows different opinions to be heard, even if they do not win out in the end.

Excerpt:

Argentine archbishop Jorge Bergoglio was selected as pope at a time when the Roman Catholic Church in this South American country is facing a rebellion by priests and laypersons who reject the role of the church leadership during the 1976-1983 dictatorship and the lack of reparations for past omissions and complicities.

The accusations against Bergoglio for his alleged ties to the dictatorship, which made headlines around the world when his appointment as pope was announced by the Vatican, are just the tip of the iceberg of a controversy that has raged for decades without a solution and which is coming to light as the regime’s human rights violators have been brought to trial since the amnesty laws were scrapped.

Groups like Curas en la Opción por los Pobres (Priests with an Option for the Poor), Cristianos por el Tercer Milenio (Christians for the Third Millennium) or Colectivo Teología de la Liberación (Liberation Theology Collective) have voiced increasingly harsh criticism against the Argentine bishops’ conference’s shortcomings in terms of self-criticism, in spite of an apology and pledge to investigate issued a few months ago.

Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio in Buenos Aires in 2008. Credit: 3.0 CC BY-SA

“It’s good that this debate is happening, that we work to clarify what happened, so that the truth will come to light. That would be very healthy,” Claudia Touris, a researcher at the University of Buenos Aires and the coordinator of Relig-Ar Grupo de Trabajo en Religión y Sociedad de Argentina (Relig-Ar: Working Group on Religion and Society in Contemporary Argentina), told IPS.

The debate that has divided Catholics in Argentina broke out as a result of a statement issued in November 2012 by the Argentine bishops’ conference, in which they apologise “to those we let down or failed to support as we should have” during the dictatorship.

They also promised to carry out “a more thorough study,” to find out the truth.

The statement was issued as a “Letter to the People of God” and was titled “Faith in Jesus Christ leads us to truth, justice and peace.” It condemns the crimes committed as a result of “state terrorism” but adds that “We also know of the death and devastation caused by the violence of the guerrillas”.

Opponents of the regime criticise that interpretation.

Cristianos por el Tercer Milenio described the statement as falling short because it denies the connivance between some prelates and the dictatorship. According to the group, made up of laypersons, those who served as military chaplains should be demanded to provide information, and “scandalous situations that confuse and weaken the faithful should be brought to an end.”

For their part, Curas en Opción por los Pobres said they were “scandalised by so many stances running counter to the Gospels” and by the fact that priest Christian von Wernich, who was sentenced for human rights violations, “was not expelled from the priesthood,” and unrepentant former dictator Jorge Rafael Videla, found guilty of crimes against humanity, continues to receive communion.

On the eve of Bergoglio’s appointment as pope, Curas en Opción por los Pobres, priests who live and work in Argentina’s slums, loudly protested because the bishops had taken reprisals against one of the priests who had criticised the statement released by the bishops’ conference.

Bishop Francisco Polti of the northern province of Santiago del Estero transferred Father Roberto Burell, one of the signatories of the letter that the Curas en Opción por los Pobres sent to the bishops, from his parish.

“We aren’t going to call you ‘estimados’ (esteemed – the formal form of address in a letter in Spanish) because we do not esteem cowards,” says the letter sent by the priests.

The priests also told the bishops that when they are no longer bishops “only the powerful will be sorry, because the poor, the peasants and indigenous people will celebrate.”

That was the climate among Catholics in Argentina when Cardinal Bergoglio was elected Wednesday Mar. 13 as the first pope from Latin America.

Touris said the bishops’ conference statement was considered overly timid by many Catholics, although it was a fairly novel call for those who have information on forced disappearances or the theft of the children of political prisoners – two human rights abuses widely committed by the dictatorship – to come forward.

“We’ll have to see if this continues, and if it goes deeper,” she added.

She said there was no single, unanimous Church position with respect to the regime, which is why some bishops were ideologically in line with the military and helped “sweep out alleged communist infiltrators,” while other priests and bishops supported the victims of persecuation.

As examples of the former, Touris mentioned Cardinal Raúl Primatesta, army vicar Victorio Bonamín, and archbishops Adolfo Tortolo and Antonio Plaza – all of whom are dead – who witnesses said they had seen in clandestine detention centres.

But, Touris said, there were also bishops who stood alongside the victims of the regime, such as Jaime de Nevares, Jorge Novak or Miguel Hesayne, as well as dozens of priests, nuns, seminary students and laypersons who were kidnapped, “disappeared”, murdered, or forced to flee into exile.

Two bishops are considered martyrs for their opposition to the regime.

The first is Enrique Angelelli of the diocese of the northern province of La Rioja, who was killed in 1976 in a purported car accident which is suspected to have been a murder. The other is Carlos Ponce de León, bishop of the Buenos Aires district of San Nicolás, who also died in a suspicious car crash in 1977.

At the time, Bergoglio was the Jesuit Provincial (elected leader of the order). Two Jesuit priests who worked in poor neighbourhoods were abducted. Some accuse the new pope of turning them over, but others say that on the contrary, his influence saved them.

Touris said the superior general of the Society of Jesus was Spanish priest Pedro Arrupe, who urged the priests to assume a political and social commitment. As a result, more Jesuits were persecuted, tortured and forcibly disappeared in Latin America in the 1970s than priests from any other order.

In Argentina, under Bergoglio’s leadership, the order assumed a more traditional position, the professor noted. He urged the more socially committed priests to abandon their social activism in order to avoid repression, as he himself stated in his defence.

Argentine human rights activist and 1980 Nobel Peace Prize-winner Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, an active believer, said this week that “the Catholic Church did not take a homogeneous stance” with respect to the regime, and “there were bishops who were complicit in the dictatorship…but not Bergoglio.”

“I believe he lacked the courage to support our struggle for human rights at the most difficult times,” Esquivel said in a statement issued by his organisation, Servicio de Paz y Justicia (Peace and Justice Service) in Argentina.

No one would expect a Pope elected by an extremely conservative conclave to implement revolutionary reforms within the Catholic Church. Still, many see in the newly elected Pope Francis some signs of change.

Jorge Mario Bergoglio (76), cardinal and archbishop of Buenos Aires, was elected Wednesday by an assembly of Roman Catholic cardinals, and became the successor to Pope Benedict XVI, who abdicated unexpectedly in February.

This is the first time in the history of the papacy that a non-European from the Jesuit order has been elected as pontiff.

The reaction among hundreds of people gathered Wednesday night in St. Peter’s Square in the Vatican City awaiting the announcement was positive. Some feel this is because the new Pope chose the name Francis, a symbol of poverty and interreligious dialogue, and because of the non-conventional attitude he struck with his first few words.

“Signs are important,” Tonio dell’Olio, an Italian priest and head of the international section of Libera, a leading anti-corruption association, told IPS. “The choice of the name (and) his very simple and humble way of addressing the people is already a promise of change.”

“Perhaps it is the kind of change that does not reflect our common parametres and expectations, and won’t necessarily (fit into) the category ‘progress’, which we normally use for our evaluation. But what is certain is that we are facing a change that will need to be fully understood” in time.

Certainly, Cardinal Bergoglio is a theological conservative with a clear stand on “non negotiable values” like abortion, gay marriage and the adoption of children by gay couples,  some of the main causes for clashes with Argentina’s left-leaning government.

Bergoglio also has a history of ambiguous relationships with Argentina’s 1976-1983 military dictatorship – during which the country was torn apart by the conflict known as the Dirty War — which were made public through extensive reports that have appeared over the last few years.

Yet Christians have seen in his symbolic, unconventional actions some signs of hope for a humbler Church, closer to the people.

To the eyes of more progressive churches, the challenge of responding to civil rights issues is something the new Pope cannot delay further, nor the necessary, renewed, interreligious dialogue.

“We want to congratulate him and express best wishes to him (in the hopes) that he can be a leader of the Catholic Church who can build a real, strong and sincere ecumenical and interreligious dialogue, (together) with modern Western culture,” Pastor Eugenio Bernardini, moderator of the Waldensian Church, told IPS.

The 58-year-old father of three recently succeeded former moderator Maria Bonafede, the first woman to hold such position.

In cultural, political and social arenas, Bernardini said, leaders of the Catholic Church tend to deliver “monologues” rather than “engage in frank dialogues”.

This is also true for the ecumenical relation with different Christian confessions, which has been on hold since the time of John Paul II, he said. “Yes, we do meet regularly and have fraternal relationships but no concrete steps have been taken on ecumenism.”

The same is true from the point of view of rights. Much of the international community now recognises values such as personal responsibility, democracy, and transparency, which the Catholic Church fails to recognise, Bernardini said. “But the Catholics are now asking the Church to move on these lines.”

While no particular progressive steps are expected from Bergoglio from a doctrinal point of view, his devotion to Francis, the saint of the poor, and his personal lifestyle, which has been described as “simple and close to the poor”, might lead to a different style of handling the controversial relationship between power and money within the Church.

In a phone interview with IPS, Bernd Nilles, secretary-general of CIDSE, a Brussels-based international alliance of Catholic development agencies, said he expects the new Pope to pay particular attention to the poor.

“We do hope that Pope Francis, in his reflections and guidance, will go beyond the encyclical from former Pope Benedict XVII, where he already spoke of human dignity, charity and global injustice,” Nilles told IPS.

“Maybe this new Pope who comes from the global South, has worked with the poor and understands the daily struggles of poor people and communities, can give new perspective on what exactly human dignity means and how we can overcome the suffering of so many people.”

According to Nilles, Bergoglio is also well placed to understand “the potential and the creativity of the contribution that poor communities can make to a world that is in crisis.

“Let’s take the issue of sustainability and respect for nature: the modern world we have created is reaching planetary boundaries with our (current rate of) resource consumption. Pope Francis, by choosing this name, indicates already that we need a fundamental change in the way we live, in terms of how we deal with natural resources but also how we deal with people.”

Given that the Catholic Church has made the fight against poverty and social justice a high priority, many organisations build their daily advocacy and lobby work for global justice on the key pillars of this teaching, he said.

But much of how these teachings are translated into action depends on the Pope and the presence of the Church’s commitment “in the field”.

“We hope for a leadership that will strengthen our efforts for a more just world,” Nilles added.

For Pastor Benardini, it will be hard for the new Pope to introduce deep changes, being an expression of Catholic conservatism.

“This Pope was very close to John Paul who had a very conservative approach. He is leading an institution with a very traditional – and non transparent – selection method,” he stressed.

The change in such rigid institutions will come about primarily through a bottom-up push, he said, from a request raised by society.

“If the pope is able to listen to the people and can bring about a progressive change of direction” that will be a good result in and of itself, he added.

“He is the third consecutive non-Italian pope. But if the Roman Curia and the Vatican remain attached to tradition, even a Pope who comes from another continent will have to struggle a lot to reproduce in Rome the more open, informal and lively approach of faith in non-European countries.”

The selection of a Latin American pope, who is known for his austere lifestyle and his work with the poor, has created a stir among Catholics in the region, who are confident that Pope Francis will help bolster the Vatican’s tarnished reputation.

To the surprise even of Argentine cardinals, the archbishop of Buenos Aires, Jorge Bergoglio, was elected the new pontiff Wednesday, and his first actions as he greeted crowds of faithful from the balcony over St. Peter’s Square thrilled those clamouring for a leader to demonstrate a clear preferential option for the poor.

Sources consulted by IPS say Pope Francis is conservative in doctrine, but his lifestyle, they all agree, testifies to his unassuming modesty and closeness to the poor, the homeless, the sick, the elderly, prisoners, immigrants, victims of human trafficking for sexual exploitation and forced labour, and to parish priests.

Pope Francis on his first appearance in St. Peter’s Square. Credit: The Vatican

The hope is that his personal qualities will help to restore the credibility of the Catholic Church and the Vatican, rocked by paedophilia and corruption scandals. For deeper changes, those in the know recommend waiting for the first appointments to his entourage and his future designations of cardinals.

“The bishops of northwest Argentina were all very happy,” Pedro Olmedo, the bishop of Humahuaca in the province of Jujuy, who was meeting with about ten other bishops of the region, the poorest in the country, when the news broke, told IPS. “There were tears, because we know him well, he always helped us and was there for us.

“Having a Latin American pope has been an aspiration of the region for many years. The Vatican has opened itself to a church from the New World, in a choice made by cardinals, the majority of whom are European. I hope this will give the Vatican a Latin American imprint, even in its structures,” said Olmedo.

Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff, a founder of Liberation Theology, a social justice-oriented current that stresses a ”preferential option for the poor” and has been heavily criticised by the Vatican, was also optimistic about Pope Francis’s first gestures of humility, beginning with his selection of the name of Francis of Assisi, the 12th century friar who devoted his life completely to the poor.

At the Fifth General Conference of the Bishops of Latin America and the Caribbean, held in May 2007 in Aparecida, Brazil, Bergoglio was elected by the bishops to draft the concluding document. It sets out the regional church’s position on a wide array of issues.

The document recognises the Church’s concern that in Latin America, home to 43 percent of the world’s Catholics, the growth of new members is lower than the rate of population growth. And it expresses regret for “the weakness of our option for the poor.

“The preferential option for the poor is one of the most characteristic facets of the Latin American and Caribbean Church,” says the text, which also laments “the significant number of Catholics who leave the Church in order to join other religious groups.”

Bergoglio appears to have lived in accordance with this commitment. He gave up the archbishop’s palace and chauffeur-driven car, to live in a room adjacent to the Cathedral in Buenos Aires. He travelled by bus or metro, cooked his own meals and avoided social events and the press.

Those close to him say he visited HIV/AIDS patients at the Muñiz Hospital for infectious diseases. He was also a frequent visitor to homeless shelters and soup kitchens, personally cared for elderly and ailing priests, and could be seen at bus stops when he went home in the early hours of the morning.

Organisations working against labour and sexual exploitation in Buenos Aires counted him as an ally. He often visited victims of trafficking, was moved by their testimonies and denounced those responsible for these forms of slavery in his homilies.

He would often visit penitentiaries, another issue raised in the concluding document from Aparecida, which calls for strengthening pastoral work in prisons.

The greatest stain on Bergoglio’s past is his alleged complicity with the 1976-1983 military dictatorship, when he was the provincial superior of the Jesuit order. He was accused of failing to protect priests and catechists who were subsequently abducted, and in some cases were forcibly disappeared.

He was called to testify as a witness in a case investigating these crimes, and in another investigation of the illegal appropriation of the young daughter of disappeared parents. Bergoglio stated he only found out about the theft of the babies of political prisoners after the end of the dictatorship.

Argentine theologian María Alicia Brunero, a retired university professor who has written several books on ethics, told IPS that “the important thing about the designation is not so much that it has fallen on an Argentine or a Latin American, but on someone from the periphery, outside of Europe.

“The cardinals are hoping for solutions to arrive from outside, from someone with a different profile, who is less contaminated and removed from the Vatican’s pomp and bureaucracy, and in that sense Bergoglio fulfils the expectations, because he is an austere man, who travels on buses and is close to the people,” she said.

Brunero, who knows Bergoglio personally, said that he is also someone who “knows how to command and delegate,” and that “he is not exempt from the aspiration to power, which is not necessarily a bad thing. He knows how to build networks and does it well, without trampling on anyone,” she said.

“He gives me hope,” she said.

On the other hand, no great changes in doctrine can be expected from him, Brunero said. As archbishop, he was an uncompromising critic of Argentina’s law on same-sex marriages and of any attempt to decriminalise abortion.

But she did predict he might bring a breath of fresh air to other issues.

“Ninety percent of theologians believe that women can exercise the priesthood, and the majority also want priests to be able to marry. It is possible that steps in this direction may be taken during his papacy,” she said.

Brunero said the priesthood is the Church institution facing the deepest crisis at present. Half of the priests ordained in recent years have left the priesthood, not because of loss of faith, but “because they fell in love, or came into conflict with Church structures because of its rigidity on the issue,” she said.

She pointed out that the first Vatican Council, in 1869, focused on the figure of the pope. The second, in 1959, focused on the bishops. “Perhaps there will now be a third council focused on priests,” she said.

In contrast with the conservatism of his other positions, in Buenos Aires Bergoglio reprimanded priests who refused to baptise the children of single mothers. He also accepted non-Catholic godparents for baptism candidates, Gustavo Vera, an activist for the rights of victims of labour and sex trafficking, told IPS.

The pope is open to inter-faith dialogue, and has had frequent contacts with representatives of the Jewish religion in Argentina.