A»,

Chid

Addresses and Homilies
given in

BRAZIL

Translation by

National Catholic News Service

PHN

PAUL

II





JOHN

PAUL

il



Copyright 1980. Publications Office, United States Catholic Conference, 1312 Massachusetts Avenue

N.W., Washington, D.C. 20005. Translations of Pope John Paul II’s addresses, speeches, homilies used

by arrangement with National Catholic News Service.



'^ru /..

‘ 7 come because this country with its immense majority of

Catholics evidently bears within it a special calling in the

contemporary world and in the concert ofthe nations.

REMARKS ON ARRIVAL IN BRAZIL
Brazilia. June 30, 1980

Your excellency, Mr. President of the Republic,

your eminences, your excellencies, archbishops

and bishops, most dear friends,

1 . It was not without great and profound emotion

that I just now kissed the good and generous soil

of Brazil. This gesture has been repeated 1 3 times,

for that is the number of countries that I have had

the pleasure of visiting as pope. I kissed this soil

with the fervor and spontaneity that enters into

something that is being done for the first time,

hence my emotion is that of an act performed for
the first time. It is meant to show early, silent

gratitude for the welcome that this country is

giving me. A thousand more and less evident signs

make me feel that this welcome is charged with
warmth and affection.

I wouid once again express in words my
gratitude for this welcome. Its quality is reflected

wonderfully in the words that you, Mr. President,

have just addressed to me, in your own name but
also in the name of the whole of the noble Brazilian
people. My gratitude goes out to all those here who
in various ways represent this nation and its

people.

1



2.

This visit to Brazii now beginning has been a
iong pondered dream, i desired to get to know this

land for many different reasons. It pleased Divine

Providence to permit me to make this visit, in
response to the fraternal invitation extended to me
by the Brazilian episcopate, as well as to the

respectful invitation made by the president of the

Republic of Brazil, and this invitation was warmly

seconded by all the Brazilian people. Innumerable

letters reaching me over recent months well
showed this. May the Lord of history be blessed
and thanked for the joy that he is granting me. I

trust that the joy may be yours as well.

3.

I am here on a purely pastoral and religious
mission. God’s mysterious and loving designs

appointed me to be bishop of Rome, successor of
the Apostle Peter, and so vicar of Christ and visible

head of his church. I feel as addressed to myself

that tremendous yet comforting command to
strengthen my brother bishops in their mission (cf
Lk 22,32), and, like them, to strengthen the

children of the Catholic Church in intrepid and

radiant faith. That is, faith as shall lead them to

give witness to the world of the reasons for their

hope in Christ (cf.1 Pt.3,15), and to communicate

the unfathomable riches of Christ’s love to the

world
( cf. Ef. 2,7). This is the purpose in the visits

that I am making to various countries and
continents. Because of it these visits may be

called pastoral visits or missionary pilgrimages.

4.

Why Brazil today? You, Mr. President, have
already mentioned a number of reasons in your

2



delicate remarks. Above all because your land

came to birth in the shadow of the cross, it was

baptized with the name of True and Holy Cross.

Then it was nourished with the first Eucharist,

celebrated at Porto Seguro, and it became the

nation with the largest number of Catholics in ali

the worid. The church grew and gained strength

here so much as to be today a reason for joy and

hopefuiness throughout the Catholic worid. My
visit is intended as an act of homage to this church

and to encourage it to be evermore the sacrament

of salvation, performing its mission within the

framework of the universal church. To whom God
gives much, much shali be asked (cf.Lk 12,48).

in the second place, I come because this

country with its immense majority of Cathoiics

evidentiy bears within it a speciai cailing in the

contemporary world and in the concert of the

nations. In the midst of the anxieties and

uncertainties, and — why not say so? — of the
sufferings and bitterness of the present, Brazil will

be able to show itself a country that will have much

to offer tomorrow to the grand community of the

nations.

Please God that this prospect may spur Brazii to
buiid up an exempiary form of sociai co-existence,

by overcoming imbaiances and inequaiities, in

justice and concord, with iight and courage,

without shocks and ruptures. Such wiii certainly

constitute an outstanding contribution to

internationai peace, and thereby to mankind.

It is not too much if he whose mission inciudes
an important aspect of construction of peace

should offer encouragement in this matter, i rejoice

3



that a series of events has served as the mold for

this visit. I rejoice together with you at the honor of

the altar that has been conferred upon a pioneer of

evangelization of your people, Blessed Joseph de

Anchieta.

Together with you I adore the most blessed

Eucharist in connection with the tenth National

Eucharistic Congress, which I shall inaugurate at

Fortaleza in a few days. Together with you I

express my filial devotion to the mother of God in
her majestic shrine of Aparecida. Together with

you I give thanks for the existence of the Latin

American Episcopal Conference, founded 25 years

ago in Rio de Janeiro.

5. Your religious history — and often your
history as a nation — was written by heroic,
dynamic and virtuous missionaries. It has been

continued by the dedication of devoted servants of

God and men, God’s brethren. All have left deep

traces in the Brazilian soul and civilization.

Through this rapid mention the pope desires to

render a homage of gratitude to all of them, in the

church’s name.

The history of the church in Brazil is so

intimately bound up with the history of the country

that your nation is seen to be marked above all by

fidelity to Christ and to his church.

6. I hope, desire, and pray to God that my visit

may serve as stimulus to increasing consolidation

of the church, the community of salvation among

you, to the benefit of all Brazilians and the

universal church!

4



My journey of faith is meant to be as weii a
piigrimage towards meeting with man, human

persons. I therefore at this moment embrace — at
least in the spirit — every person iiving in this
Braziiian fatheriand. I wouid iike to be abie to talk

with each and every one of you ali, beioved

chiidren of Brazil. I would like to visit each famiiy,

to get to know ail the states and territories, to go to

see ail ecclesial communities of this great and

beioved nation. How many insistentiy invited me to
do so!

You will certainly understand that this wiil not be

possibie. So, as i tread this Braziiian soii for the

first time, my thoughts and my amity go out,
through those that stand here, to those that are not

here but who wish that they were here. My
thoughts go to aii those that are prevented from

participating at meetings with the pope by famiiy

duties, by work, by ministries or the apostoiate, by

reasons of poverty, iiiness or age. The pope is

thinking of each one. He ioves all and to all he

sends a very Brazilian greeting: “urn abraco!” (an

embrace).

Together with this gesture of friendship may you

receive my prayers for your happiness: May God
bless your Brazil. God bless you all, Brazilians,

with peace and his prosperity, and serene concord

in comprehension and fraternity. Under the

maternai gaze and the protection of Our Lady of

Aparecida, patron of Brazii!

5



Digitized by the Internet Archive

in 2016

https://archive.org/details/addresseshomilie01cath



‘

'The trips that I am taking. . . have a specific apostolic

character and strictly pastoral objective, but in addition to

this religious character, they carry also a message specifical-

ly about man, his values, his dignity and his social life.
’

'

ADDRESS TO BRAZIUAN PRESIDENT

JOAO BAPTISTA DE FIGUEREDO

Brazilia. June 30, 1980

Mr. President,

May my first word to you be to express my
profound gratitude to your exceiiency. And i want

to express this gratitude using one of the first

expressions that I iearned in my recent study of
the Portuguese language and which has for me a
special meaning: “Muito obrigado” (many thanks).

Many thanks for the generous welcome affirmed

and demonstrated since your excellency became

aware of my intention to accede to the wishes of
my brother bishops of Brazil that I visit this
country.

Many thanks for the kind presence of your
excellency at the airport at the moment in which I

stepped on Brazilian soil and for the kind words

you have just spoken to me. I ask that you

consider them directed not just to me, but to the

mission which has been invested to me and to the
universal church, of which I am pastor.

The trips that I am taking, following the initiative
of my predecessors, above all Paul VI, constitute a

7



very important aspect to me of my pontifical

ministry and of the pastoral governance of the

church.

They have a specific apostolic character and

strictly pastoral objective, but in addition to this

religious character, they carry also a message

specifically about man, his values, his dignity and

his social life.

I come, therefore, to meet with the church of

Brazil, with the Catholic community that

constitutes the great majority of the population of

this vast and populous nation. But I also come

wishing to meet with all the beloved people of

Brazil.

Thus, this meeting is with almost half a

millenium of human and religious history. In this

history there is certainly the inevitable lightness-

darkness that is found in the history of every

people. May God give his help so that light prevails
always over the shadows. In the historical profile

of this illustrious nation, I want to emphasize three

points:

— The well-known Brazilian ecumenism, which
has been capable of integrating peoples and

values of diverse ethnic backgrounds, which

surely contributed to the characteristics of

openness and universality of the culture of this

country.

— Evangelization, which was done in such a way
and with such continuance that it left profound

marks on the lives of this people, providing without

doubt, to the degree to which this fits in the

mission of the church, principles, norms and moral

and spiritual energies which shaped the human
and national community.

8



— The youthful energy of the population, with its
respective traditions and diverse qualities, surely

guarantees that the nation will overcome the

obstacles that will be found in its historic course,

leading to a better tomorrow.

Evangelized since the beginning, the Brazilian

people have lived the faith and the message of

Christ, certainly not without problems, but with a

sincerity and simplicity clearly attested to by its

traditions, in which can be seen glimpses of

options, interior attitudes and behavior in fact

Christian.

In addition to this, as your excellency had the

kindness to mention, there are many ties that link

Brazil to the Apostolic See in Rome, distinguishing

a century and a half of friendly official relations,

uninterrupted and ever more solid with the passing

of time.

They have a guarantee of authenticity in the love

and devotion of the Brazilians to the vicar of Christ.

The warmth of the reception which is given me
here is an expression of this.

Mr. President, honorable members of the

Congress, the Senate, the Supreme Court, the

ministers of state, ladies and gentlemen:

With your honorable presence here on my arrival
and now in this meeting you wanted to honor the

pastor of the universal church, an honor for which

he is extremely appreciative; “Muito obrigado”

once again to each one of you personally.

I want to take this opportunity to express the

highest esteem for the noble mission you carry out.

The mandate you have received, confers on you

the privilege — that is also an obligation — to

9



serve the common good of the whole nation,

serving the Brazilian people. May God help you

always to fulfill this mandate.

In my apostolic pilgrimages throughout the world

I also want, with the help of God, to be the bearer

of a message and collaborate in the humble but

indispensable way which is my part so that an
authentic meaning of man prevails in the world, not

confined in strict anthropocentrism, but open to

God.

I have a vision of man that has no fear in saying;

Man cannot abdicate from himself, nor from the

place to which he belongs in the visible world. Man

cannot become a slave to things, to materiai

riches, to consumerism, to economic systems or to

that which he himself produces. Man cannot be

made a slave to anyone or to anything.

Man cannot eliminate the transcendental — in
the last analysis, God — without cutting himself off
from his total being. Man in the end wiil only be
able to find light for his own “mystery” in the

mystery of Christ.

How beneficial would it be for the world if there
were an understanding of man from this truth, as
the only one capable of giving a human dimension

to the diverse initiatives of daily life —political,
economic, social, cultural, etc. Rapidly this would

become a base for programs of the “true
civilization,” which can only be a “civilization of

love.”

Attending to its proper mission and with clear

respect for the legitimate institutions of the

temporai order, the church can only be pleased

with ali that is honest, just and valid which exists

10



in those institutions for the service of man. It can

oniy see with satisfaction the efforts to save and

promote the fundamentai rights and liberties of all

human persons and ensure these responsible
participation in the social and community life.

For this very reason the church does not cease

to proclaim the reforms needed for the safety and

promotion of those values without which no society

worthy of the name can prosper, that is, reforms

that have in view a more just society and are in

accordance with the dignity of the human being.

Thus, it urges those responsible for the common

good, above all those who call themselves

Christians, to undertake in a timely way those

reforms, with decision and courage, with prudence

and efficiency, which are based on Christian

criteria and principles, objective justice and an

authentic social ethic.

Thus, promoting such reforms is also a way of

avoiding their being looked upon as only impulsive,

in which no hesitation is made in using violence

and the direct or indirect suppression of the rights

and fundamental, inseparable liberties of the

dignity of man.

Wishing the dear Brazilian people an always

growing fraternity based on an authentic sense of

man, with liberty, equality, respect, generosity and

love among all its members, and with a lucid and

solid opening for humanity and for the world, I wish

you a safe and secure peace, based on mutal work

and the striving of all for progress and well being.

I wish you also the sufficient and indispensable

goods for the development of the human person. I

ask God that each Brazilian of birth or adoption

11



respect and always see respected the fundamental

rights of all peoples. To proclaim and defend these

rights, without setting them before the rights of

God or silencing the obligations that correspond to

them, is a constant of the life of the church in

virtue of the Gospels which are entrusted to it.

Thus, do not cease to invite all men of good will

and encourage their children to the respect and

cultivation of these rights — the right to life, to
security, to work, to a home, to health, to

education, to religious expression, both private

and public, to participation, etc.

Among these rights it is impossible not to
mention as a priority the right of parents to have

children as they wish, receiving at the same time
what is needed to educate them in dignity, and the

right of bearing life.

We know how many of these rights are being
threatened in our days in the whole world.

I heartily bless what is done here in communion

with universal efforts, which can only be for the

benefit of the poorest and most marginalized

pesons afflicted by the undeserved frustrations of

which they are wictims.

In this sense, it is never too late to remember

that never has a transformation of political, social

or economic structures been consolidated, if not

followed, by a sincere “conversion” of the mind,

the will and the heart of man, with ail its truth.

This has to happen, taking into account, on the

one hand, the avoidance of pernicious confusions

between liberty and instinct, of self-interest, of

fighting or of domination, and, on the other hand.

12



the creation of solidarity and fraternal love which

are immune to any false autonomy in relation to

In this line of thinking, all of society is

coresponsible. But initiatives and the human

direction and logic of the processes depend in

large part on those who are invested with positions

of government and of leadership.

It depends on its original task of renewing and

forming attitudes with adequate, constant and

patient processes of education and of utilizing

good will, always enlightened py the “certainty that

it is’’ man, the final beneficiary of his

responsibilities and worries, as you wrote to me a
while ago, your excellency.

The particular qualities of the Brazilian people,

united with your long Christian tradition, will bring

you to respond with certainty to the call and the

challenge of the third millenium which approaches

and the communion of minds and hearts in the

search for the common good.

Clarified, proposed and generated by the

leaders, and with corresponding free, educated

and joint participation of all, you must continue to

serve man and the supreme good of peace in this

great nation, in this continent and in the world.

Reiterating my gratitude to your excellencies for
the reception and all the attention, I ardently wish

for God’s abundant blessings on Brazil through the

intercession of Our Lady of Aparecida, your patron

saint.

13



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"The diplomatic way is a way ofwisdom in the sense that

it is based on the ability ofpeople ofgood will to listen to

one another, to understand one another, to find

negotiated solutions, to progress together instead ofcom-

ing to confrontations. ”

ADDRESS TO DIPLOMATIC CORPS

Brazilia. June 30, 1980

Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen.

On this first day spent in the Brazilian capital I
am very happy to meet with the heads and
members of dipiomatic missions accredited to the

government of this country. I heartily thank you for

coming this evening for this appointment with the

pope, who himself has representatives in most of
your countries.

In expressing to each and every one of you my

cordiai greetings, i think also of all the nations of

which you are sons and daughters and which you

represent in Brazil. And to all the people dispersed

throughout the American continent and in the other

continents I express my esteem and the sincere
best wishes of the church which cails itself

Catholic, that is to say universal, open to all human

societies for whom it wishes the original
blossoming, thanks to the development of that

which is best in their countries, in their culture, in

human beings themselves.

15



Your task as diplomats takes place through the

noble means which lead to reconciliation of

peoples, to their reciprocal esteem and

understanding, to their exchanges, to their cultural

or economic collaboration, in a word to peace.

The diplomatic way is a way of wisdom in the

sense that it is based on the ability of people of

good will to listen to one another, to understand

one another, to find negotiated solutions, to

progress together instead of coming to

confrontations. Today more than ever the problems

of peace, security and development are not limited

to bilateral relations: there is a compex whole in

which every country must make its contribution to

the betterment of international relations, not only

to avert conflicts or diminish tensions but to

present a united front before the great problems of

the future of humanity which concern us all.

And here one hopes that every man or woman,

particularly the leaders of nations and then their

representatives, may aid the convictions, the
principles, likely to promote the true good of

persons, of peoples, within the international

community. It is to this which the Holy See wishes

to witness in bringing to the level of consciences

its own specific contribution.

In the limits of this brief meeting I am able only to
evoke the principles of peace within and peace

outside a country. It may seem banal to emphasize
that each country has the duty to preserve its

peace and security within. But it must in any case

“deserve” that peace by assuring the common
good of all and the respect of rights. The common
good of a society requires that it be just. Wherever

justice is lacking, the society is threatened from

16



within. This does not mean that the
transformations necessary to bring about a great

justice must be based on vioience, revoiution or

bioodshed, because vioience prepares a society of

vioience and we Christians cannot agree to that.

But it does mean that there are sociai

transformations, sometimes profound, to be

reaiized constantiy, progressiveiy, with

effectiveness and reaiism, through peacefui

reforms.

Aii citizens take part in this duty, but obviousiy it

is a particuiar responsibiiity of those who exercise

power, because theirs is a service of sociai justice.

Power has the right to demonstrate itseif strong

vis-a-vis those who cuitivate an egoism of one

group to the detriment of the whole. It must in any

case demonstrate itself to be at the service of men

and women, of each man and woman and
especially those who need sustenance. The

church, on its part, will work without rest to bring

to mind its concern for ‘the poor,” for those who
are disadvantaged in any way. In any case power

must not be permitted to violate the fundamental

rights of man, and I do not need to enumerate here

those which I have often mentioned, particularly in

my speech of Oct. 2 of last year before the United
Nations.

Vis-a-vis the other countries, one must grant to

every nation the right to live in peace and security

on its own soil without being subjected to unjust
external threats, which may be of a military,
ecnomic or ideological order. On this most
important point all men of good will must achieve
unanimity and, I dare say, especially the

diplomats. But non-interference is not enough.

17



because it would mean indifference to the type of

peopie whom nature or historicai circumstances
have disadvantaged to the point that today a great

number of their sons and daughters iack the

minimum necessary for a worthy human iife in the

matter of bread, health or education. There is an

internationai soiidarity of promotion. It is taiked

about a iot, but the realization is too restricted or

aggravated by conditions from which the weight of

new threats come. Peace, here, cails for a joint
deveiopment, and not for the accumuiation of

weapons of fear nor the push for revoit, as I said

recentiy at UNESCO.

We must constantiy set out before this world
duty of peace in justice and deveiopment to find

the words and gestures which, iittie by iittie, may

buiid a worid worthy of the human being, that world

which God wants for men and women, and of

which he has given them responsibility,

eniightening their consciences, it is the faith that I

have in you, dear dipiomats, which moved me to
share with you this ideal. May God inspire you and
biess you. May he bless your families. May he
biess and protect your homeiands. May he guide
the internationai community on the road to peace

and brotherhood.

18



"...the church assumes a commitment ofcontinuously an-

nouncing to the youth a message of total liberation and a

message ofsalvation that she has heardfrom the mouth of

the Savior himself... ”

HOMILY TO YOUTH

Belo Horizonte. July 1, 1980

Dear youth and my friends,

You will not be surprised that the pope begins

this homily with a confession. I had already read

many times that half of your country’s population is

less than 25 years of age.

Contemplating since my arrival in Brasilia and
wherever I went an infinity of youthful faces, upon

arrival in this city, passing between thousands of

young people, seeing you young people so

numerous around this altar, I confess that I

understand better, from this specific point,

something which I had understood only in an

abstract way.

I believe I understand better also because the

bishops at Puebla spoke of a preferential, but not

exclusive, option, a priority for youth.

This option signifies that the church assumes a

commitment of continuously announcing to the

youth a message of total liberation and a message

of salvation that she has heard from the mouth of

the Savior himself, which should be spread with

total fidelity.

2. At this Mass I have the happiness of
celebrating in your midst and for your intentions.

19



this message appears with its essentiai meaning in

the readings that we hear.

“Observe what is right, do what is just” (Is. 56,

1 ).

The prophet Isaiah exhorts us with a force that

never tires from a distance of 2,500 years. And he

adds that it is important above ail to be strong in

the aiiiance that God seaied with man. It is an

invitation to coherence and fidelity, an invitation

that touches the young very ciosely.

In the letter of Paul to the Corinthians is a fine

and convincing word, as was the habit of the great

apostie, “No one can lay a foundation other than

the one that has been laid, nameiy Jesus Christ (of

1. Cor. 3, 11).

He knew weii what he was saying, this Paul, who
when young had persecuted his church. But on the

road to Damascus one beautifui day there was the

unexpected meeting with this same Jesus. And it

was the witness of his own iife that made him say,

“There is no other foundation possibie. It is urgent

to piace Jesus as the foundation of existence.”

And in the Gospel of St. Matthew is the page that
no one rereads without emotion. “Who do peopie
say that the Son of Man is?” (Mt. 16, 13) asked
Jesus of the aposties and, after they had given him

severai repiies, the deeper question, ‘ Who do you
say that I am?” (Mt. 16, 15).

We ail know it is not sufficent to speak of Jesus,
repeating what others say. it is necessary to say

what you think, it is no ionger sufficient to recite

an opinion. It is necessary to give witness, feei

committed by the witness given and often to the

extreme of this witness.

20



The best friends, followers and apostles of

Christ always were those who perceived one day
within themselves the final irrefutable question,

before which all the others became secondary and

derivative: “Who do you say that I am?”

The life, destiny, history and future of the young

depend on the clear and sincere answer, without

rhetoric or subterfuge, that they can give to this

question. It has already transformed the lives of

many youths.

3. And it is from the message offered from the

word of God that I would like you to take this

simple message that I leave you at this encounter,

that will allow me to feel the seriousness with
which you face your existence.

You are the great richness of this immensely

rich country. The real future of this country is

present in you. Thus, this country, and with it the

church, looks to you with an expectant and hopeful

eye.

Open to the social dimensions of man, you will

not hide your will to transform radically the

structures that present injustices in society.

You rightly say that it is impossible to be happy

whike seeing the multitude of brothers who lack
the minimum opportunities for a human existence.
You also say it is indecent for some to have in
excess what is missing on the table of the rest.

You are committed to constructing a just society,

free and prosperous, where each and every one

can use the benefits of progress.

4. I lived in my youth with these same
convictions. I proclaimed them as a young student

21



through the voice of literature, the voice of art. God

willed that they received their coloring in the fire of

a war whose atrocitities did not spare my home.

Many times I saw these convictions trampled

upon. I feared for them, seeing theo exposed to the

tempest. One day I decided to confront them with

Jesus Christ. I thought I was the only one to rebel

against their real content and value, protecting

them against I don’t know what inevitable erosion.

All this, this tremendous and valuable

experience, taught me that social justice is only
true if based on the rights of the individual. And

these rights to be really recognized must be

recognized for the transcendental dimension of

man, created in the image and likeness of God,

called to be his son and the brother of other men

and destined to eternal life.

To negate this transcedence is to reduce man to
being an instrument of domination whose fate is

subject to the egoism and ambition of other men or
to the omnipotence of a totalitarian state created

as the supreme value.

In my inward self that led me to the discovery of
Jesus Christ that carried me unrestricted to him. I
perceived what the Second Vatican Council stated

clearly.

I understood that “the Gospel announces and

proclaims the freedom of the sons of God and
rejects all bondage resulting from sin, it
scrupulously respects the dignity of conscience

and its freedom of choice, it never ceases to

encourage the employment of human talents in the
service of God and the well being of man and.

22



finally, it commends everyone to charity for aii.

This is nothing other than the basic law of the

Christian scheme of things” (“Gaudium et Spes,”

n. 41).

5. i iearned that a Christian youth ceases to be

young, and there are many who are not Christian,

when they are seduced by doctrines or ideoiogies

that preach vioience and hate.

One does not buiid a just society on injustice.

You do not buiid a society that deserves the titie of

human by not respecting or, worse yet, destroying

human iiberty, denying to the individuais the most

fundamentai iiberties.

Sharing as a priest, bishop and cardinai the iives

of many young peopie in universities, in youth

groups, in excursions to the mountains, in prayer

circies and refiexions, I learned that the young

dangerously begin to age when they are fooied by

the adage, “The end justifies the means,” when

they beiieve that the oniy hope of bettering society

is by promoting fighting and hatred between sociai

groups in the utopia of a society without ciasses

that soon ieads to the creation of new ciasses.

I convinced myself that only loves approaches

that which is realiy different and reaches together

in diversity the word of Christ, “This is my
commandment; iove one another as I have ioved

you” (Jn. 15, 12).

it came to me then, besides its unparaiied
theoiogicai profoundness, as the seed and

principie of the oniy radicai transformation to be

appreciated by a young person, as the seed and

principie for the oniy revolution that does not

betray man. Only true love builds.

23



6. If the youth that 1 was, called to live my youth

in a crucial moment in history, can say anything to

the youth that you are, I think I can say, “Don’t

become an instrument. Search out, being

conscious of what you want and what you do. But I

see that this same thing was said by the bishops of

Latin America, meeting in Puebla last year;

“We will inculcate in young people a critical-

minded attitude toward. ..the cultural counter-

values that various ideologies try to impart...”

(Puebla document, n. 1197), especially the

ideology of a materialistic character, so that they

are are not manipulated.

And Vatican II says, “The social order requires

constant improvement: it must be founded in truth,

built on justice and enlivened by love: It should

grow in freedom towards a more humane
equilibrium” (“Gaudium et Spes,” 26).

A great predecessor of mine. Pope Pius XII,

adopted as his motto, “Build Peace in Justice.” I

think that is a motto and above all a commitment

worthy of you, Brazilian youth.

7. I fear that many good intentions for building a

just society swim in inauthenticity and are emptied

like a soap bubble lacking the support of a serious

attempt at austerity and frugality.

In other words it is indispensabie to know how to
win against the temptation of the so-called

consumer society, the ambition of having more in

place of trying to be more, the ambition of having

more while others have less.

I think in this respect the beatitude which

speaks of the poor in spirit has a definite force and

reievance in the life of each youth; the weaithy

24



young man will then learn what is superfluous and
what is almost always lacking for others so that he

will not leave (the Lord) in sadness (Mt. 19, 22)

when he realizes in the innermost part of his

conscience that the Lord is asking for fuller

renanciation.

May the youth who lives in rough contingency

and uncertainty regarding tomorrow, perhaps even

in hunger, and who is looking for the legitimate

improvement in conditions for himself and others

be attracted by dignity but not by ambition or

fascination with the superfluous.

My friends, you are also responsible for the
conservation of those values which have always

honored the Brazilian people. Do not be carried

away by the exaggeration of sex that violates the

authenticity of human love and leads to the

deterioration of the family.

“Are you not aware that you are the temple of

God and that the Spirit of God dwells In you?” (1
Cor. 3, 16) wrote St. Paul In the text we heard.

The young woman should look to find true
feminism, the authentic realization of woman as a
human person, an integral part of the family and
society in a conscious participation, following her

nature.

8. I reread, finishing the key words that we took
from the reading for this Mass:
— Observe what is right and do what is just.
— Do not build on any foundation except Jesus

Christ.

— Have an answer to give our Lord when he
asked, “For you, who am I/”

25



This is my sincere and confident message as a
friend. My wish would be to shake the hands of
each one of you and talk to each of you. In any

case and to each one, I say to all, youth of Belo

Horizonte and of all Brazil, the pope wishes you

well, the pope will never forget you. The pope

leaves here with a wonderful memory of you.

Receive my dear friends, the apostolic blessing
that I am going to give you at the end of the Mass
as a sign of my friendship and confidence in you
and to all the youth of this country.

26



“I pray that this spirit of family shall never come to be

weakened or perish. That it may prevail over any seed of

discord or division whatever, over any threat of mpture or

separation.
’ ’

HOMILY AT MASS FOR FAMILIES

Rio de Janeiro. July 1, 1980

My very dear brother, archbishop of Sao
Sebastiao do Rio de Janeiro and your auxiliary

bishops.

Dear children living in this wonderful city, dear

children come from other parts of Brazil for this
meeting:

1 . Many of those who are at this hour partaking

in this Eucharist will be going in their hearts’

memories back to other Masses celebrated in this

same place, in July 1955. The 35th International

Eucharistic Congress was going on. Upon a strip of

land regained from the sea, the hands of artists

had raised an altar-monument. There the papal

legate opened and concluded the great event. The

voice of my immortal predecessor, Pius XII,

resounded here with a father’s message for a

million persons gathered in this place. It is not

possible for me indeed to fail to recall this 25th
anniversary. I am glad to recall it together with you
and among you, at the time when you are

preparing for the imminent 10th national

Eucharistic congress at Fortaleza. May it please
God that these events, those remembered, those

27



being lived, those looked forward to, will mean

renewal of your thanksgiving to God. May it please

him that you will be able to utter your thanksgiving

through what is thanksgiving by definition and by

excellence, the Eucharist. May he cause you to
grow in devotion to it.

The gift of the Eucharist

2. A priest — be he pope, bishop, or an inland
parish priest — who celebrates the Eucharist, and
a Christian who takes part in the Mass and

receives the body and blood of Christ, cannot fail

to go deep into the marvels of this sacrament.

Many dimensions may be considered within it. It is

the sacrifice of Christ, being mysteriously

renewed. The bread and the wine are transformed,

transubstantiated into the body and blood of the

Lord. It is grace that is communicated to the

Christian’s soul through this spiritual food... On
this present occasion I would dwell upon a not less

significant aspect; the Eucharist is a family

reunion, a gathering of the big family of Christians.

The Lord Jesus willed to institute this great

sacrament on the occasion of an important family

event. That event was the paschal meal. On that
occasion his family was the 12, who had been
together with him for three years. For a long time in

the church’s early days families met in the houses

of other families for “breaking of bread.” Every

altar will always be a table, about which a more

and less numerous family of brethren will gather.

At the same time the Eucharist brings that family
together, and shows to the eyes of all how close
are the ties binding its members to each other. St.

28



Augustine was thinking of aii this when he caiied

the Eucharist "sacramentum pietatis, signum

unitatis, vinculum caritatis”(sacrament of piety,

sign of unity, bond of charity) (In Joannis Evang.

Tract. XXVI, cap.6, N.13., PI 35,1613).

As I celebrate this Eucharist I turn my eyes
spiritually to all quarters of this immense country. I

seek to embrace in one sole glance the 120

millions of Brazilians. I pray for the immense family

constituted by all the children of this fatherland

and for those here who have found a new
homeland.

3. May I tell you something in confidence? When
they first spoke to me of Brazil I knew very little of
the country. They did not speak to sing its natural

beauties, which are marvellous, nor to extol the

wealth of its soil and subsoil, which are

inexhaustible. Nor to bring out the deeds of one or

another notable Brazilian. He who spoke to me —
and he had great knowledge of Brazil — told me
only that it was a great nation, in spite of all its

eventual problems, because all races have met

there: people from all over the world have gathered

there into one people, without prejudices and

without discrimination or segregation. They have

met in a bright fusion of spirits and hearts. “It is a

family,” my informant told me, enchanted.

I pray that this spirit of family shall never come

to be weakened or perish.That it may prevail over

any seed of discord or division whatever, over any

threat of rupture or separation. I pray that, as

differences grow less among Brazilians in regard

to progress and wellbeing, opportunities in respect

29



of cultural goods and civilization, and possibilities

to find worthy work, to have heaith and education,

and to bring up children, this “great family” of

Brazilians of which my first Instructor about Brazil
spoke, may become an ever truer reality. I further

pray that Brazil may give an essential lesson of

true Integration In a world frequently dominated by

strife among peoples and races, and that she may

do so without ostentation, but rather with the

spontaneity and naturalness that mark her people.

May she show how persons coming from the

most diverse corners of the world can live together

as a single family in a country that is also a

continent. And I pray, finally, for the members of

this “great family” who lie below this monument.
Their sacrifice is a permanent appeal for unity

among the peoples.

4. This Eucharist, family gathering, brings my
thoughts once again to Brazilian families.

The most authoritative investigations into Latin

America teach us that the family is of extraordinary

importance for you, Latin Americans, i am thinking
of the documents produced at Medeliin and at

Puebla, and of reports coming to me from bishops
and episcopal conferences In this quasl-continent;

but I am thinking as well of sociological studies of
great seriousness. The place that the family

occupies in the peoples that go to make up the

roots of your nations and the influence that It

exerts in formation of your culture, are further

reasons for this importance. Far from being an

exception, Brazil exemplifies this truth in a notable

degree. It is not to be wondered at that here family

30



feeling is manifested with special vigor, the

essential dimensions of family reality are

confirmed. That is, respect imbued with iove and

tenderness, generosity and spirit of solidarity,

appreciation for a certain intimacy of the home,

tempered by desire to be outgoing. Nor may I fail to

exalt two fundamental family dimensions among

the others. They are specially important among

you, and over the centuries it has been the great

transmitter of cultural, ethical, and spiritual values,

from one generation to another. On the level of the
Christian religion, when other channels were

lacking or were extremely precarious. It has often

been the sole, or at least the principal channel

through which the faith was conveyed from

parents to children in the various generations.

5. In view of this, how shall we look upon the
grave situations in which numerous families are

concretely involved among you, how shall we look
upon the serious threats that weigh on the family

in general?

Some of these threats are of a social kind. They
arise from subhuman conditions, in dwellings,

hygiene, health, education. Millions of families are

in these conditions, in the interior of the country

and on the outskirts of the big cities, by force of

unemployment or insufficient wages.

Other threats belong to the moral order. They are

connected with generalized disintegration of the

family, through ignorance, depreciation, or

disrespect of human and Christian norms
regarding the family in various levels of the

population. Others again belong to the civic order.

31



They are linked with legislation referring to the

family. Such legislation is becoming more and

more permissive throughout the world. It Is thus

less encouraging for those who try to follow the

principles of a more elevated ethic in the matter of

the family. Please God that It shall never be so In

your country. May it please him that, in
accordance with the Christian principles that

Inspire your culture, those who have responsibility

to make and proclaim laws shall do so in respect

for the irreplaceable values of a Christian ethic.

Outstanding among these is the value of human

life, the undeclinable right of parents to transmit

life. Other threats, finally are In the religious order.

They derive from scarce knowledge of the

sacramental dimensions of matrimony in God’s

plan.

6. The considerations that I am uttering seem to
me to bring out sufficiently clearly the Importance
and necessity of intelligent, courageous, and

persevering famiiy pastoral care. When I spoke to
the people of the city of Puebla, In the homily of

the unforgettable Mass that I celebrated there, I

recalled that numerous Latin American bishops do

not hesitate to acknowledge that the church still

has much to do In this field. For this reason, when I

opened the conference at Puebla, I chose to

recommend family pastoral care as an Important

priority in all your countries. The Puebla document

devoted an Important chapter to the family: May
God will that attention to other themes and

concerns in that document — and they are
undoubtedly important, yet not exclusively so —
will not mean giving less attention to the pastoral

32



care of the family. Such an error is something that

we should have reason to regret later.

This family pastoral care has many fields and
complex requirements. Your pastors are aware of

this. Many laity engaged in diverse, valuable and
worthy family movements show how attentive they
are to these fields and requirements. You certainly

do not expect the pope to go into them here. This

is not the moment for that. However, how can I not
recall or at least mention a few among the more
important points of this form of pastoral care?

I am thinking of all that has to be done in the
field of preparation for marriage. Certainly in the

period before the wedding, but why not also from

the years of adolescence on — in the family, in the
church, in the school? In the form of serious,

ample, deep education for true love, something

much more demanding than generalized sexual

education. I am thinking of a generous and
courageous effort to create a propitious

environment in society for realizing a Christian

family ideal, based on the values of unity, fidelity,

indissolubility,and responsible fecundity. I am
thinking of the attention to be given to marriages

that for various reasons and circumstances are

passing through moments of crisis. They might

overcome these crises if they received help, but

sometimes they break up if they are not aided. I am
thinking of the contribution that Christians,

especially laity, can offer, towards obtaining social

policy that shall be sensitive to family needs and

values, and towards avoiding legislation harmful to

family stability or equilibrium.

I am thinking, finally, of the measureless value of
a family spirituality, which needs to be constantly

33



perfected, promoted, and propagated. Nor can I not

utter a word, here again, of stimulus and

encouragement to family movements that devote

themselves to this particularly important work.

7. The church’s components and magisterium

are not without most valuable elements for lucid,

comprehensive, and intrepid pastoral attention to

families. My predecessors left us valuable
documents. Many pastors and theologians have

offered us the fruit of their experience and their

reflections. Before long the synod of bishops will

make a study of “The Functions of the Christian

Family” in the contemporary world. It will certainly

show ways and give guidelines in this delicate

matter. It is from this fount — and not from beside
it, even less in contrast with it — that true family
pastoral care must drink.

Innumerable families, Christian couples

especially, desire and ask for such criteria as shall

aid them to live their Christian ideal in regard to

fidelity, fecundity, and rearing of children, even in

the midst of uncommon difficulties and with efforts

that are sometimes heroic. No one has the right to

betray this expectation or to disappoint this

request, by concealing the true criteria because of

timidity, insecurity or false respect, or by offering

doubtful criteria, not to say criteria openly straying

from the teaching of Jesus Christ transmitted by

the church.

8. Dearest brethren and children, at the end of

our reflections, let us give our attention to the texts

of the New Testament that we have the joy of
hearing in this liturgy.

34



One of them is from the Gospel of St.John. It

recounts Jesus’ teaching in the synagogue at

Capharnaum on the bread of life: as the Lord

assures us, this bread is his own flesh, made food

for his disciples. It gives them a life that begins

here on earth and leads into eternity. The promise

given at Capharnaum has been fully kept in the

Last Supper and in the mystery of the Eucharist.

This is the bread that becomes the body of Christ

so as to give life to men.

The pope’s deepest and liveliest desire at this

moment would be to work a kind of miracle and

enter every home in Brazil, to be the guest of every

Brazilian family, to share In the happiness of happy

families and give thanks to the Lord together with

them. To be with families that weep, for some

hidden or visible suffering, so as to give them

some comfort, if possible. To speak to families

where nothing is lacking so as to invite them to

distribute what they have in excess; it belongs to

those who have nothing. To sit at the table of poor
families, where bread is scarce, so as to aid them,

not to become rich in the sense that the Gospel

condemns riches, but to win what is necessary for

a decent life.

If this be an impossible desire, I nonetheless

desire to make a vow and form a prayer, as I

shortly take Jesus’ body and his precious blood In

my hands: that this Eucharist, celebrated in this

boundless temple, under the cupola of this sky of

Rio de Janeiro — much vaster and grander than
Michelangelo’s — may become the source of true
life for the Brazilian people. In order that the

Brazilian people shall be a true family, and for

each Brazilian family, in order that it shall be a

formative cell of this people.

35



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36

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‘

‘What I thought how I shouldpresent myselfto the in-

habitants ofthis country which I visit for the first time, I

felt it my duty to present myselfbefore anything else with

the teaching ofthe eight beatitudes.

REMARKS AT FAVELA VIDIGAL

Favela Vidgal. July 2, 1980

1 . When Jesus climbed the mountain and started
to proclaim his teachings that we all know as the
Sermon on the Mount to all the people about him,

before anything else the beatitudes flowed from

his lips. The first of them proclaims; “Blessed are

the poor in spirit, because theirs is the kingdom of

God” (Mt.5, 3).

There is only one mountain in Galilee where

Christ uttered his beatitudes. However there are so

many places all over the world where the same are
announced and heard.

Many are the hearts that do not cease from

reflecting on the meaning of those words said once

for all. They do not cease from meditating on them.

Their only wish is to practice them with all their

heart. They try to live these beatitudes in their

truth.

On Brazilian soil there are certainly many places
like that. And here there were and are many, many

of these hearts.

When I thought how I should present myself to
the inhabitants of this country which I visit for the

first time, I felt it my duty to present myself before

37



anything else with the teaching of the eight

beatitudes. I felt the wish to talk about these to

you, people of Vidigal.

Through you I also would like to talk to all who in
Brazil live in the same conditions. Blessed are the
poor in spirit.

2. Among you are many poor. The church in the

Brazilian land wants to be the church of the poor.

She wishes that in this great country the first

beatitude of the Sermon on the Mount may be

fulfilled.

The poor in spirit are the ones who are more

open to God and to “God’s wonders” (Acts 2, 11).

They are poor because they are always ready to

accept this gift from heaven which comes from

God. They are poor in spirit, those who live

knowing that they have received all from God’s

hands as a free gift and who appreciate everything

they receive.

They are constantly thankful, they unceasingly

repeat: “All is grace, thank our Lord God.” Of them

at the same time Jesus says they are “pure in their

hearts,” “meek.”

They are those who “hunger and thirst for
justice.” They are frequently “the afflicted.” They

are those who are “peacemakers” and
“persecuted for justice’s sake.”

They are, finally, the “merciful” (cf Mt. 5, 3-10).

In fact the poor, the poor in spirit, are more

mercifui. For that reason hearts open to God are
more open to men. They are ready to help and to

be useful. They are ready to share what they own.

38



They are ready to welcome a widow or an

abandoned orphan.

They always find one more place in the midst of

the restrictions they live in. And even so they

always find some food, a piece of bread on their

poor table.

Poor, but generous. Poor, but magnanimous. I

know there are a lot of people like that among you

here, to whom I am addressing my words, and in

other parts of Brazil as well.

3. Do Christ’s words about the poor in spirit

perhaps make one forget about injustices? Do they

allow us to leave without solution the different

problems raised by the whole of the so-called

social problem?

Problems that remain in human history assume

different forms at different moments of history and

their intensity depends on the dimension of each

society in particular as well as the proportion of

continents, the whole world in a word. It is natural

that these problems assume their own dimension

in this land, a Brazilian dimension.

Christ’s words calling the “poor in spirit’’ happy

do not claim to suppress all these problems. On
the contrary, they make them more evident,

focusing them upon this most essential point, man,

the human heart, every man without exception,

man in regard to God and at the same time in

regard to other men.

Does not being poor in spirit precisely make a

man more open toward others, that is, toward God
and his fellow man?

39



Is it not true that this beatitude of the “poor in

spirit” also contains a warning and an accusation?

Is it not true that it tells the ones who are not
“poor in spirit” that they are out of God’s kingdom

and that the kingdom of God is not and never will

be shared by them? Thinking of these “rich” men

who are closed to God and to mankind, without

mercy, was not Christ to say in another passage,

“Woe to you” (Luke 6, 24)?

“Woe to you.” These words sound severe and

threatening, especialy in the mouth of Christ who

always spoke kindly and gently and who used to
repeat, “May God bless you.” However, he will also

say, “Woe to you.”

4. All over the world the church wants to be the

church of the poor. The church in Brazil also wants

to be the church of the poor, that is, she wants to

draw out all the truth in Christ’s beatitudes and

especially this first one: “Blessed are the poor in

spirit...” She wants to teach this truth and practice

it, as Christ came to do and to teach.

The church also wants to draw out all that in the

teaching of the eight beatitudes refers to each

man: the poor, the one who lives in penury, the one
who lives in abundance and well being and, finally

the one who has an excess and has more than he

needs. The same truths of the first beatitude refer

to each one in a different way.

She tells the poor, the ones who live in misery,
that they are particularly close to God and his
kingdom, but at the same time she tells them that it
is not permissible for them and their families —for
anyone — to arbitrarily be reduced to misery.

40



It is necessary to do everything licit to assure

oneself and one’s family whatever is necessary for

life and maintenance. In poverty it is above all

necessary to keep human dignity and also that
magnamity, that openness of heart toward others,

that readiness which exactly distinguishes the

poor, the poor in spirit.

To those who live in abundance or at least with a

certain well being, for which they have the

necessities (even though they may not save), the

church who wishes to be the church of the poor

says: “Enjoy the results of your work and of

rightful industry, but in the name of Christ’s words,

in the name of human brotherhood and of social

solidarity, do not stay closed in yourselves.

“Think about the poor. Think about the ones who

have not what is needed, the ones who live in

chronic want, who suffer hunger. Share with them.

Share in an organized and methodical way.”

May abundance never deprive you of the
spiritual fruits of the Sermon on the Mount or

separate you from the beatitudes of the poor in

spirit.

And the church of the poor says the same, with

greater force, to those who have an excess, who

live in abundance, who live in luxury. She tells

them: “Look around you a bit. Does it not hurt your

heart? Do you not feel the stings of your

conscience for your surplus and abundance? If

not, if you only want to ‘get’ more and more, if your

model is profit and pleasure, remember that man’s

value is not measured by what he owns but by

what he ‘is.’”

So someone who has saved much and thinks
that everything in life is reduced to that should

41



remember that he might be worth much less than

some of those poor people, that in his soul and

under God’s eyes maybe he is “much less of a

man” than they.

The measure of wealth, money and luxury is not

the same as the measure of the real dignity of men.

So those who have a superabundance should

avoid closing in on themselves in attachment to

their riches, a spiritual blindness. May they avoid

this with all their strength. May all the Gospel truth

be with them, especially the meaning of these

words; “Blessed are the poor in spirit because

theirs is the kingdom of heaven...” (Mt.5, 3).

May this truth upset them.

May it be a continuous warning and challenge to
them.

May it never allow them to become blinded by
selfishness and the satisfaction of their own
desires, not for one minute.

If you have a lot, if you have a great deal,

remember that you must give a lot, that there is

much to give. And you should think how to give,

how to organize all social-economic life and each

of its sectors so that this life would tend toward

equality among men and not toward an abyss
among them.

If you know much and you are of high social

rank, do not even for one minute forget that the

higher you are, the more you should serve. Serve

others.

Otherwise you will find yourselves in danger of

keeping yourselves and your lives from the field of

the beatitudes and in particular from the first one:

“Blessed are the poor in spirit.”

42



The “rich” who, by means of their wealth, do not

stop from “giving themselves” and “serving

others” are “poor in spirit” as well.

So the church of the poor speaks first and above

all of man. To each man and so to all men. She is

the universal church, the church of the incarnation

mystery, not the church of one single class or one

single race.

She speaks in the name of her own truth. This

truth is realistic. We should take into consideration
each human reality, each injustice, each tension,

each conflict. The church of the poor will not serve

anything that causes tensions and makes strife

among men explode.

The only fight, the only one that the church will

serve is the noble one for truth and justice, the one

for the real good, the one where the church is at

one with each man.

On this road the church fights with the “sword of
truth” without abstaining from encouraging, as well

as warning, sometimes in a very severe way (as

Christ did). Very often she even threatens and

shows the consequences of hypocrisy and evil.

In this evangelical fight the church of the poor

will not serve immediate political purposes, power

struggles. She tries at the same time with great

care to ensure that her words and actions not be

used for that purpose, that is, “instrumentalized.”

The church of the poor speaks to “mankind,” to

each and to all men. At the same time she speaks

to society as a whole and to different social levels,

to different groups and professions. She speaks to

systems and to social structures, both socio-

economic and socio-political.

43



She speaks the Gospel’s language, explaining it

in light of human knowledge but without
introducing strange, heterodox elements contrary

to her spirit. She speaks to everybody in the name

of Christ, as weil as in the name of man,
particularly to those for whom Christ’s name is not
everything, does not express all the truth about

man that this name contains.

So the church of the poor speaks like this: You,

particulariy the ones who in decision-making have

power, you, on whom the world situation depends,
do everything so that the life of each man in your

country may become “more human,’’ more worthy

of man.

Do everything so that at least gradually the

abyss that divides the few “excessively rich’’ from

the great multitudes of poor, those who live in
want, may disappear.

Do everything so that this abyss will not grow but

shrink and tend toward social equality, so that the

unjust distribution of goods will give way to a more

just distribution.

Do it out of consideration for each man who is

your fellow man and your fellow citizen. Do it out of

consideration for the common good of all. Do it for
yourself. Only a socially just society, one that

strives to be ever more just, has a reason to exist.

Only such a society has a future ahead of it.

A society that socially is not just and that does

not try to become so has its future in danger.

Think, then, about the past and look at it nowadays

and plan a better future for your whole society.

All this is included in what Christ said in his

Sermon on the Mount, in the context od this single

44



sentence: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, because

their is the kingdom of heaven.”

Dear brothers and sisters, with this message I

renew my feelings of deep affection, and as a
pledge of God’s blessing for you and your families,

I give you my apostoiic biessing.

45



46



‘

‘Culture should not suffer any coercion on the part of

power, whether economic or political, but ought to be

aided by the one and the other in allforms ofpublic and

private initiative, in accordance with true humanism, with

the tradition and with the authentic spirit ofeach

people.
’ ’

ADDRESS AT RIO CATHEDRAL

Rio de Janeiro. July 2, 1980

Beloved brothers and sisters in Christ,

During this piigrimage through Brazii i have

aiready had the pieasure of seeing much of your

beautifui country and of the goodness and nobie

sentiments and spirit of faith of its peopie, and

here i see the same things. May God be praised! i

thank my beioved brother, Cardinai Eugenio de
Araujo Saies, and ali, through him, for this good

welcome that is being given to me now and which i
have had here in the Archdiocese of Rio de Janeiro

from the preparation committee and aii

organizations and persons that have taken part.

Together with the cardinai-archbishop i wish to

greet his auxiiiary bishops and aii diocesan and

reiigious priests who make up the iocai body of

priests (presbytery). They share in a particuiar and

intimate fashion with the diocesan pastor the

responsibilities inherent in being messengers and

distributors of the goods of saivation. Behoid! As

“sait of the earth” and “iight of the world” you are

striving to buiid up the church here according to

47



well worked out pastoral plans. Be always the

visible presence of the sacred in this great

metropoiis by iiving and acting, each of you, as

what in the truth you are: an “aiter Christus” who

goes about doing good.

i likewise greet women Reiigious here present

and here represented, i know that you are weli

organized here in Rio. i count on your support for

pastorai labor and in addition on the ever essentiai

support of your life of prayer. Live your

consecration with generous commitment and

adherence to and readiness for the Lord. Live it in

the church and in service to the church’s mission.

Strong in faith, be joyful in hope.

RiO DE JANEiRO, Brazii (NC) — Here is an NC
News Service transiation of Pope John Paul ll’s

remarks to cultural leaders at the residence of

Cardinal Eugenio de Araujo Sales July 1.

1 . I feel happy at being able to meet with you,

eminent cultural personalities of the Brazilian

nation. I wish to greet each one of you heartily and

show my sinere appreciation and my deep respect.
You well know how much and for what reasons the
church values and promotes, inasmuch as be her

concern, every authentic form of culture and seeks

to maintain communication and dialogue with

culture.

The meeting place between the church and

culture is the world. In it man, who is a “being-in-
world,” is subject to development through one or

the other thing, church and culture, through God’s

word and grace on the part of the church and

through man himself, with all his spiritual and

material resources, on the part of culture.

48



True culture is humanization inasmuch as non-

culture and false cultures are dehumanizing. By

this same token man commits himself to his

destiny in the school of culture.

Humanization, that is to say the development of

man, is effected in all fields of the reality in which

man is situated and situates himself: in his

spirituality and corporality, in the universe, in

human and divine society. It is a matter of

harmonious development. In this, all sectors of

which the being man forms a part are linked with

each other: culture does not regard solely the

spirit or solely the body, nor, likewise, solely

individualities or sociality or universality.

Reduction “ad unum” always gives rise to

dehumanizing cultures in which man is either

spiritualized or is materialized, is dissociated or is

depersonaiized. Culture ought to cultivate man and

each man and woman within the compass of an
integral and full humanism. In this every man and
all men are developed in the plenitude of each
human dimension. Culture has the essential aim of

promoting the being of man and of providing him
with the goods necessary to the development of

his individual and social being.

2. All the various forms of cultural promotion are

rooted in “culture animi,” according to Cicero’s

saying. It means cultivation of thinking and loving.

Through that man raises himself to his supreme
dignity, which is that of thought, he exteriorizes his

self in the sublimest of his gifts, that of loving.

Authentic “culture animi” is cultivation of liberty,

that which emanates from the depths of the spirit,

from lucidity of thought and from generous

49



disinterest in regard to love. There can be no

culture outside of liberty. A people’s true culture,

its fuli humanization, cannot develop in a regime of

coercion. “Culture” says the council’s constitution

“Gaudium et Spes” (No. 59) “since it flows from

man’s rational and social nature, has continual

need of rightful freedom of development and a

legitimate possibility of autonomy according to its

own principles.”

Culture should not suffer any coercion on the

part of power, whether economic or political, but

ought to be aided by the one and the other in all

forms of public and private initiative, in

accordance with true humanism, with the tradition

and with the authentic spirit of each people.

Culture that is born free ought also be able to

spread in a regime of liberty. A man of culture has

the duty to propose his culture to others, but not to

impose it. Imposition contradicts culture, because

it contradicts that process of free personal

assimilation on the part of thought and love which

is peculiar to the culture of the spirit. An imposed

culture not only contrasts with man’s liberty, but

can hold up the formative process of his own

culture. This, in its complexity, from science to

forms of dress, arises from collaboration among all
men and women.

The church claims for culture, hence for man, a

liberty analogous to that which it claims for

religious liberty in the council’s declaration,

“Dignitatis Humanae.” The claim regards both the

process of cultural development and the act of

cultural propagation. That liberty is founded

essentially on the dignity of the human person and
is made known both by means of God’s word and

50



through reason (Cf n.2). Culture ought to promote

liberty at the same time as it respects it. That is, it

ought to seek to garb it with the virtues and habits

that go to make what St. Augustine caiied “iibertas

maior.” This means iiberty in its fuii development,

liberty in a moraily aduit state, capabie of

autonomous options in the face of temptations

coming from whatever form of disordered self-iove.

Fuli cuiture comprehends morai formation,

education in the virtues of individuai iife, sociai iife

and reiigious iife. “There is no doubt,” i said in my
recent discourse to UNESCO, “that the prime and
fundamentai cuitural fact is spirituaiiy matured

man, that is, the fuily educated man, man capabie
of educating himself and educating others. Nor is

there any doubt that the prime and fundamentai

dimension of cuiture is sound moraiity: morai

culture” (n.12).

3. Culture, cultivation of man in ail his facuities

and expressions, is not soieiy promotion of

thinking and acting, but it is aiso formation of

conscience. Because of imperfect or no education

of conscience, pure knowledge may give rise to

proud humanism that is pureiy earthiy. Action and

pleasure may give rise to pseudo-cuitures of

unchecked productivism for the benefit of nationai

power or private consumerism, with the unhappy

consequences of danger of war and most grave

economic crises.

Promotion of knowiedge is indispensabie, but it

is insufficient when not accompanied by morai

cuiture.

“Cuitura animi” ought to promote instruction and

education together. It ought to instruct man in

51



knowledge of reality. At the same time it ought to

educate him to be a man in the totality of his being

and his reiationships. Now man cannot be fully
what he is, he cannot realize his humanity fully,

unless he lives the transcendence of his own

being over the world and his relationship with God.

Elevation of man is not only a matter of promoting

his humanity, but it is also a matter of opening his

humanity up to God. Making culture means giving

man, and every man and woman, and the

community of mankind, a human and divine

dimension, to offer and communicate to man that

humanity and that divinity that emanate from

perfect man, the redeemer of man, Jesus Christ.

In the work of culture God makes an alliance

with man, he himself becomes a cultural worker for

the development of man. “Dei agricultra estis,’’ St.

Paul exclaims: “You are God’s cultivation” (1 Cor

3,9). Have no fear, gentlemen, open the gates of

your minds, of your society, of your cultural

institutions to God’s action. He is man’s friend and
works in man and for man, so that man may grow
in his humanity and in his divinity, in his being and

in his reality over the world.

In the alliance which is established between God
and man through human culture, man ought to
imitate God in his infinite love. Cultural work is
work of love, work that proceeds from that social

love, the necessity for which I pointed out in my
first encyclical letter, “Redemptor Hominis” (cf

n.16). Where there is a lack of social love, through
lack of esteem for others, the plurality of legitimate

cultures is not respected. Rather there is a will to

impose one’s own culture —which is neither
unique nor exclusive — upon economically and

52



politically weaker populations. Let us remember

what the council said: “Many nations, poorer as far

as material goods are concerned yet richer as

regards wisdom, can be of the greatest advantage

to others” (“Gaudium et Spes,” n.15).

4. The cultural unity of a country as vast as

yours, where numerous traditions and various

historical processes are amalgamating, does not

arise from uniformity of culture. It arises from a

plurality unified through mutual respect,

recognition of cultural peculiarities, enriching

dialogue, enrichment with the values and

experiences of others.

5. I think that I am doing an elementary duty of
justice if at this point I evoke the unpretentious yet

exemplary cultural work that has been the

church’s in this country.

We meet in this work all those aspects of culture
that we have recalled so far. From the early years
the church began to convey knowledge of things to

the aboriginals, together with the revelation of the

Gospel, through her missionaries. That knowledge

undoubtedly consisted in instruction and in the

alphabet. But there was no less an effort to perfect

the basic elements of the indigenous culture,

without deforming or adulterating them. The

church continued down the centuries to make a
valid contribution to the cultural task through her

missions among the Indies and settlers, through

schools and unversities, through hospitals and

hospices, through her means of social
communication. I judge it important to emphasize

in this domain that the church’s message was not

alien to the harmony and equilibrium with which

the process of amalgamation of the most diverse

races has gone on.

53



Taking culture in its widest sense, we have to

say of Brazil what the Puebla document says of

Latin America: The church is historically at the

root of this country’s culture.

6. A work that respects the people’s original

culture, permitting its development and spread and

facilitating dialogue with other cultures, is the work

called alphabetization.

We read in “Populorum Progressio”: “An
illiterate person is an undernourished spirit.

Knowing how to read and write, to gain trainig for

work means gaining confidence in oneself and

discovering that one can make progress together

with others” (n. 35).

Besides this and other forms of

undernourishment of mind we have to consider the

grave state of depression in which entire

populations exist because of their economic

conditions. The economically richer and
industrially more developed countries organize

consumerism. In this is to be found the origin of

ever more emphatic imbalances between rich and

poor peoples and between populations within

single states. I made mention of this in my
encyclical letter “Redemptor Hominis” (cf. n.16).

Social love enlivened by charity must bring a

remedy to these situations. Build together,

gentlemen, a civilization of truth and love, create a

culture that will promote man more and more and
facilitate his evangelization. Help him to grow in

his human and divine dimensions, to recognize the
vaiue of his own being, the meaning of his

existence, to know and love Christ, in whom God
fully reveals himself to each man and woman and
to each people.

54



‘

‘The common good ofsociety will ever be the new name

ofjustice. It cannot be obtained through violence,

because violence destroys what it seeks to create.
’ ’

TALK TO WORKERS IN MORUMBI STADIUM

Sao Paula. July 3, 1980

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ:

1 . i feei happy and honored to be here among

you today in Sao Paulo, i am happy to discover
your city, this immense metropoiis of incredible

industrial development. Incredible industrial

growth goes hand in hand here with accelerating

urbanization, which is at once fascinating and

worrying. I am happy chiefly because I am
discovering this city through persons, through you,

men and women, who work, suffer and hope here.
You came here from all corners of this immense

country and from the whole world. You came so as

to earn your living and to collaborate in a great

common task which is vital for the whole nation:
the construction of a city worthy of human beings.

Yes, because Sao Paulo is you. Sao Paulo is not

mainly these material achievements. They are not

always guided by a just and full sense of man and

society, nor are they always suitable for organizing

an environment where it may be possible to live

lives worthy of human beings. Sao Paulo is also
the very numerous people on the fringes of

society, the unemployed, the underemployed or

the ill employed, who do not find ways of using

55



their hands and developing their generous

resources of mind and heart properly. Sao Paulo is

you. You are gathered here to ceiebrate your

dignity as workers and manifest your readiness to

work together so as to buiid up a city to the

measure of your hopes as humans. Sao Paulo is

you, assembied here to seek in the Gospei of

Jesus Christ the iight and energy necessary for

achieving the task that awaits you, that of turning

Sao Pauio into a fuiiy human city.

2. Yes, Jesus Christ, the Lord of the universe

and of history, brings us together here today. The

pope visits you in his name today. Workers, my

brothers and sisters, i give thanks to God for

having ailowed me to be among you. I thank you for
the deep joy that this meeting is causing to this

minister of Jesus Christ, in the days of his youth,

in his native Poland, he knew the condition of

being a manuai worker directiy. He knew its

greatness and harshness, its hours of joyfulness

and its moments of anguish, the accomplishments

and frustrations that go with this condition of life.

From the bottom of my heart I say to you what the
apostie St. Paui said to the Romans, “i iong to see

you and to share with you some spiritual gift to
strengthen you; rather, what i wish is that we may
be mutuaiiy encouraged by our common faith”
(Rom.1 ,1 1 -1 2). Therefore, I invite you, Christian

workers, my brothers and sisters, to begin to
ceiebrate in joyfulness and friendship what Jesus

offers to one and aii of us: the faith, hope and

charity with which Jesus eniivens our hearts when

we meet in his name, in his church, which he
established for gathering up his gifts and

distributing them to ail. Christian festivity gives joy.

56



It is not a luxury reserved for the rich. The whole

world is invited to take part. Last year those on the

fringes of society in another big metropoiis, New
York, sang the “Alleluia" of resurrection with me.

And not iong ago Africa, the Africa of poverty, gave

the pope and the worid the spectacle of an

unforgettable festivity.

And this festivity arises from the conviction that

we are loved by God and that God is with us. God
is visiting us. The kingdom of God is among us.

This is the inexhaustibie source of our joyfuiness:

we know how God loves us and recognizes us, we
know that we are free from sin, that we have been
raised to the insuperable dignity of being God’s

chiidren, rich in faith, hope and iove, which the

Hoiy Spirit pours out into our hearts. So let us

celebrate our God and our Father, Jesus Christ our

Lord and our brother, who brings us together.

The assembiy of bishops at Puebia wiiied to

commit the church in Latin America to an option

for the poor. That option is essentiaiiy this: that the

poor have the Gospei preached to them, that the

church once again set aii her energies to work so

that Jesus Christ may be announced to ali, chiefiy
the poor, and that aii have access to this living

fount, the table of the word and of bread, the

sacraments, the community of the baptized. Here

is the meaning of our meeting today, of our

Christian feast. We shaii go away from here to our
task as citizens and workers with fresh

enthusiasm. We shaii go with a ciearer
consciousness of our dignity, of our rights, of our

responsibilities. We shaii go with renewed faith in
the prodigious resources with which, by creating

us in his image and likeness, he enriches us for

57



being able to face the challenges of our time, the

challenges of this metropolis that is Sao Paulo.

3. I speak to you in the name of Christ, in the

name of the church, the entire church. It is Christ

that sends his church to all men and all societies

with a message of salvation. This mission of the

church’s is carried out in view of two perspectives

at once. There is the eschatalogical perspective.

This regards man as a being whose final
destination is God. There is the historical

perspective. This looks at this same man in his

concrete situation as incarnated in the world of

today. This message of salvation is brought by the

church in virtue of her mission to every man, to the

family, to the various social environments, to

nations and to the whole of mankind. It is a

message of love and fraternity, a message of

justice and solidarity. It is in the first place meant

for the most needy. In a word, it is a message of

peace and a just social order.

I will repeat here before you what I said to the

workers of Saint-Denis, a workers’ quarter in

another big city, Paris. I began with those most

profound words of the Magnificat. I chose to

consider together with them that “the world loved

by God is a world of justice: that the the order
which ought to regulate relations among men is
based on justice; that this order ought to be

continually being implanted in the world, always

afresh, in the measure in which situations and

social systems increase and develop, in the

measure in which fresh economic conditions and

possibilities, fresh technical and productive

58



possibilities, and at the same time fresh
possibilities and needs in distributing goods arise"

(Homiiy at Saint-Denis, May 31, 1980, n.5).

When the church proclaims the Gospel, it aiso
tries, without abandoning its specific role of

evangelization, to obtain that all aspects of social

life wherein justice is manifested may undergo a
transformation toward justice. The common good
of society demands as a fundamental requirement
that society be just. Persisting injustice, lack of

justice threaten society’s existence both from

inside and outside in the same way as everything

that represents an attack upon its sovereignty or

seeks to impose ideologies or models upon it, and

all economic and political blackmail, all use of the

force of arms can threaten society from outside

and inside.

This threat from the interior really exists when

trust is placed solely in the economic laws of

growth and greater profit for regulating the domain

of the distribution of goods, when the results of

progress touch vast sectors of the population only

marginally or not at all.

The danger exists also inasmuch as a deep

abyss exists between a very large minority of rich

on the one side and on the other side a majority of

people living in want and penury.

4. The common good of society will ever be the

new name of justice. It cannot be obtained through

violence, because violence destroys what it seeks

to create, it does this both when it is used to

maintain the privileges of some andw when it is

used in an attempt to impose necessary

59



transformations. The changes demanded for there
to be a just social order ought to be achieved

through constant action along the path of peaceful

reforms. Such action should always be effective,

although often gradual and progressive.

This is the duty of all. It Is particularly the duty of

those who hold power in society, whether

economic power or political power. All power finds

its justification only in the common good, in
achieving a just social order. Consequently, power

should never serve to protect the interests of one

group to the detriment of the others. The class

struggle is not the path leading to a just social

order, because it bears in it the risk of raising the

unfavored up to becoming the privileged, thereby

creating a fresh situation of injustice against those

who have so far had advantages. One cannot build

with hatred or the destruction of others. Rejecting

the class struggle means opting resolutely for a

noble struggle in favor of social justice. The

various power centers and the various
representatives of society ought to be able to meet,

to coordinate their efforts and come to agreement

on clear and efficacious programs. This is what the

Christian formula for creating a just society

consists in. The whole of society ought to be at

one with all people and in the first place with those

who need help, the poor. The option for the poor is
a Christian option; it is also the option of a society

that is concerned with the true common good.

5. Let us listen to what Christ himself said in this

regard. He was talking to the multitude that had

come from all over the region and from beyond the

frontiers to see him. He was seated among his

60



disciples. He began his discourse with these
words, “How blessed are the poor in spirit; the
kingdom of God is theirs” (Matt. 5,3,). He
addressed those words to others besides those

who were listening, he addressed them to us too,
gathered here in Sao Paulo in Brazil. Twenty

centuries have taken nothing from the impelling

importance, the gravity and the hope contained in

those words of the Lord’s. “How blessed are the
poor in spirit!” These words are valid for each of

us. This invitation is a call to each of us. What

Christ asks from all Is that they acquire the spirit

of being poor.

Those that have possessions ought to acquire

the spirit of being poor. They ought to open their

hearts to the poor, for if they did not do so

situations of injustice would not change. The

political structure or social system can be

changed, but a just and stable social order will not

be achieved without change of heart and

conscience. Those who have no possessions,

those who are in need, should also acquire “the
spirit of being poor”; they should not permit

material poverty to take their own human dignity

from them, for this dignity is more important than

all goods.

It is in this connection that the Christian doctrine

on man gives singular valueto human labor. This

teaching has been nourished on the Gospel, on the

Bible and by centuries of experience. The dignity

of labor. The nobility of labor. You know the dignity

and nobility of your labor as you work in order to

live, in order to live better, so as to win your

families’ daily bread. You feel wounded in your

affections as fathers and mothers at seeing your

61



children ill nourished, you who are so content and

proud when you can offer them a loaded table,

when you can clothe them well, give them a

decent, cozy home, give them school and

education in hopes of a better future. Your labor is

a service, a service to your families and to the

whole city. It is a service in which man himself

grows to the degree that he gives himself for

others. Work is a discipline wherein the
personality is strengthened.

Your prime and fundamental aspiration is

therefore to be able to work. What sufferings, what

anxieties and miseries are caused by
unemployment! Therefore, the prime and

fundamental preoccupation of all, of those in

government, politicians, labor union leaders and

owners of enterprises, ought to be to give work to

all. It is not realistic, hence it is not admissible, to

expect to find a solution to the crucial problem of

employment as a more or less automatic result of

an order of things and economic development, of

whatever kind, where employment is seen as only

a secondary effect. Both the theory and practice of

economics ought to have the courage to consider

employment and its modern possibilities as a

central element in its objectives.

6. It is a matter of justice that working conditions

be as worthy as possible, that social insurance be

perfected so as to permit all to face social risks,

hardships and burdens on the basis of increasing

social solidarity. It is legitimate to demand that

wages be adjusted in their diverse and
complementary forms to the point where it will be

62



possible to say that the worker really and equitably

shares in the wealth that he has contributed to

creating through his solidarity and his integral

participation in the enterprise, the profession and

the national economy concerned. The church has

never stopped developing a very rich doctrine on

all these points, mainly since the first great social

encyclical, “Rerum Novarum.” I call upon you all,

workers, and those with responsible positions in

politics, the professions and labor unions, to give

fresh attention to this teaching. No one is going to

find ready-made solutions, but clarification and

stimuli for thought and practice may be found

there. The task is delicate.. This complex mass of

problems contains many factors — employment,
investment, wages — that react with each other. It
cannot be settled through demagogy, through

ideological enchantments or through cold and

theoretical scientism, which, contrary to the true

scientific spirit, would leave verification of its

suppositions to an uncertain future. I will once

more repeat here what I said in regard to

employment: to expect that the solution to the

problems of pay, social insurance and work

conditions will flow naturally from a kind of

automatic extension of a certain economic order is

not realistic, therefore is not admissible. The

economy will be viable only if it is human, for man

and through man.

7. For this same reason it is very important for all

actors in economic lifeto have the practical

possibility of taking part freely and actively in

working out and supervising decisions regarding

63



themselves at all levels. Pope Leo XIII already

affirmed in “Rerum Novarum” the right of workers

to meet in free associations for the purpose of

making their voice heard, defending their interests

and contributing in a responsible manner to the

common good. The demands and the discipline
required by the common good apply to all within
the framework of laws and contracts that can

always be improved.

The church proclaims and sustains these

various rights of the workers because men and

their dignity are at stake, it does this in the deep

and ardent conviction that a man who works

becomes a cooperator with God. He is made in
God’s image. He has received the mission of
administering the universe so as to deveiop its

riches and assure them a universal destination, to

unite men in mutuai service and in common
creation of a worthy and beautiful way of living for

the glory of the Creator.

Workers, never forget the great nobility which,

as men and women and as Christians, you ought to

imprint upon your work, even the most humbie and

insignificant. Never iet yourseives be degraded by

work. Rather seek to live thoroughiy that true

dignity of labor which God’s word and the church’s

teaching put in evidence. Work reaiiy makes you

above ail collaborators with God in carrying

forward the work of his creation. Go on with that

dynamism which is contained in the command

given to the first man to popuiate the earth and ruie

it (Cf. Gen. 1 ,28). Go on, with sweat on your brows,

yes, but above all with just pride in being created

in the image of God himself.

64



Work associates you more closely with the

redemption that Christ accomplished through the

cross. It does so when it leads you to accept

everything that is painful, fatiguing, mortifying and

crucifying in the daily monotony; when it leads you

even to unite your sufferings with the Savior’s

sufferings so as to fill up “what is lacking in the

sufferings of Christ, for the sake of his body, the

church” (Col. 1,24). Therefore, work leads you in

the end to feel at one with all your brethren here in

Brazil and in the whole world. It makes you

builders of the great human family and of the

whole church as well in the bond of charity, for

each is called to aid the other (Cf.Gal. 6,2) in ever

recurrent need for mutual collaboration and in that

interpersonal aid whereby we men and women are
necessary to each other, without excluding

anyone.

This is the Christian concept of labor. It sets out

from faith in God the Creator and, through Christ
the redeemer, arrives at the edification of human

society, oneness with man. Without this vision any

effort is lacking and wasted, however tenacious it

may be. It is fated to disappoint, to fail. Build on

this foundation. And if they tell you that in order to

defend labor’s gains it is necessary to put this

Christian vision of existence aside or even to

cancel it out, do not believe them. Without God and

without Christ man builds on sand. He betrays his

own origin and his nobility. In the end he comes to

do harm to man, to offend his brother.

8. You work in the situation of a big city that

continues to grow rapidly. It is a reflection of the

65



incredible possibilities of the human race, which is

capable of admirable achievements but is also

capable of tearing and grinding man down when

spiritual motivation and moral orientation are

absent.

An exclusivist economic logic often invades all

fields of existence, spoiling the environment,

threatening families and destroying all respect for

the human person. Such logic is even more

depraved by crass materialism. Factories

discharge their waste, deform and pollute the en-

vironment; the air becomes unbreathable. Waves

of migrants pile up in indecent shacks, many lose

hope there and end in misery. Children,

y'xjngsters, adolescents find no living space for

developing their physical and mental energies

fully. They are often restricted to unhealthy quar-

ters or must wander in the streets and live in the

flow of traffic between cement walls and the

faceless multitude that wears them down and

never becomes individually known to them. There

are districts where life is lived with all modern

comforts. Beside them are others where the most

elementary things are not to be found. Some
peripheral areas are growing in disorder. Develop-

ment is often a gigantic version of the parable of

the rich man and Lazarus. The proximity between
luxury and penury heightens the feeling of

frustration in the unfortunate. A fundamental

question therefore becomes imperative: how is the
city to be transformed into a truly human city in its

natural environment, its constructions and its in-

stitutions?

An essential condition is that of giving the

economy human meaning and logic. What I said

66



about work holds good here too. It is necessary to

liberate the various fields of existence from the

dominion of subjugating economism. It is
necessary to put economic demands in their
proper place and create a multiform social texture

such as will avoid massification. No one is dispen-

sed from cooperating in this task. We can all do
something in ourselves and around ourselves. Is it

not true that the most neglected districts are often

the places where solidarity arouses gestures of the

greatest self-detachment and generosity?

Christians, wherever you may be, take your share
of responsibility in this immense effort for bringing

human restructuring to the city. Faith makes this a
duty. Faith and experience together will give you

light and energy to start moving.

9. Christians have the right and the duty to con-

tribute so far as they are able to building up

society. And they do so through associations! and

instutional frameworks that a free society operates

with participation by all. The church as such does

not claim to run society or to take the place of

lawful organs of deliberation and action. It only

claims to serve all those who at any level take on

responsibilities for the common good, its service is
essentially in the ethical and religious order. But,

in accordance with its mission and in order to

guarantee such service, the church demands with

full right a space for the indispensable liberty to

seek to maintain its specific religious nature.

So all communities of Christians, both basic

communities and parishes, diocesan communities

or the whole national church community ought to

make their specific contributions to buiiding up

67



society. All man’s concerns must be taken into

consideration. This is so because evangelization,

the church’s reason for being, any ecclesial com-

munity’s reason for being, would not be complete

unless it took into account the relations existing

between the Gospel message and man’s personal

and social living, between the commandment to

love one’s suffering and needy neighbor and con-

crete situations where injustice must be com-

batted, and justice and peace be installed.

May this meeting of ours today around Jesus
Christ bring with it the certainty that the church

wills to be present with all its Gospel message in

the heart of the city, in the heart of the poorest

people of the city, in the heart of each one of you.

You are loved by God, workers of Sao Paulo and

Brazil. And you ought to love God. This is the

secret of your joy, of a joy that will flow from your

hearts and shine in your faces and on the city’s

face as a sign that it is a human city.

68



‘ 7 would above all answer a number ofquestions that

must have more and less consciously come to the surface

in your hearts: Why has the pope come from so far to us?

What motives have brought him?”

HOMILY AT MASS

Porto Alegre. July 5, 1980

Venerable brothers, most beloved children,

1. Laudetur Jesus Chrlstus! (Praised be Jesus

Christ)

It Is with these words of Christian greeting that i

would address you at this meeting which

providence has set in the schedule of my journey
through Brazil in this hour of spiritual plenitude.

I thank you for the comfort that this so

affectionate and cordial welcome brings me. Do

not be concerned, however, with my humble
person. Rather raise your hearts to him whom that
person represents and serves, the Lord Jesus

Christ. I come to you in his name. He wiil soon
come down upon this altar. All honor and glory to
him, particulariy on this day which is iit by the mild

and peaceful triumph of the Eucharist in Brazilian

lands.

I would now meet a desire of yours, one that

perhaps has not even been expressed, i wouid

above ali answer a number of questions that must

have more and less consciously come to the

69



surface in your hearts: Why has the pope come
from so far to us? What motives have brought
him?

Well, most beloved sons and daughters, the

reason is this: I come so as to get to know you

better, to listen to you, to get into dialogue with

you, to show you that the church is close to you

and shares your problems, your difficulties and

sufferings, your hopes. I am the first pope to come
to this most beautiful country. I come, then, in

order to thank the Lord together with you for the

invaluable gift that has been made to you, the gift

of the Catholic faith. Your marvelous country,

where nature pours out immense riches, is a young

country. It is open to the future and shows

impressive vigor in all sectors of human life. But

your greatest wealth is the religious and moral

heritage of your Christian tradition. This heritage

deserves to be preserved at all costs. But, even

more, it ought also to enter into the nation’s

ascending course, to be the nation’s soul. This

should be so in order that, just as the subsoil of

your history yesterday was Catholic, so also the

spirit of your society may be alive and active in the

Christian way today.

I come to carry out the mission received by Peter
and his successors. I come to confirm you in the
faith. We heard in the second reading that Paul
went about cities already evangelized, exhorted

Christians to observe the apostolic teaching and

confirmed them in the faith that they had received.

(Cf. Acts 16,4-5). I pray to God that this apostolic
journey of mine may have the same meaning for

you and obtain the same result.

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Therefore, most beloved sons and daughters,

here is the best wish that I can give you, the

guidance that I desire to leave with you as

remembrance of my journey. It is the words of St.
Peter to the communities of the eariy church;

“Remain firm in the faith” (1 Pt. 5,9), firm in

interior, fuli and sincere adherence to the Gospei,

firm in exterior prociamation of it. Your

prociamation of it ought to be free of ail

immoderation or disrespect for the opinions of

others, but it ought to be frank, courageous,

coherent, persevering and worthy of the faith of

your fathers.

2. You are a nation that is today at a stage of

feverish transformation. This is bringing no iittie

changes about, as you weil know, not oniy in the

iook of the country, but even more in inner life and

the peopie’s way of iiving as weli.

Will the Christians of Brazil be ready to face the

shock caused by this transition from oid to new

economic and sociai structures? Wili their faith be

in a condition to remain unshakeable?

In other times it was enough for many to have a

modest mastery of elementary Instruction and that

sincere popuiar reiigiousness which is so

profoundiy rooted, with its various expressions, in

the sociai and cuitural texture of your nation.

Today it is no ionger so. The spread of cuiture,

the criticai spirit, the publicity given to ali

questions and debates require fuiier and deeper

knowiedge of the faith. Popular religion itseif ought

to be nourished with ever more extensive

expianations of reveaied truth, and it ought to be

71



freed from elements that make it seem inauthentic.

It has need of that solid food of which St. Paui

speaks, in other words, a serious and systematic

effort at catechesis is imperativeiy necessary. This

is the probiem before you today with ali its gravity

and urgency.

Providentiaiiy this effort is already being made in

your country. That effort corresponds to the

church’s fundamental task, to her prime and

specific mission. Your bishops said at Puebla, “We
have been evangelized by the Lord in his spirit, we
have been sent to bring the good news to aii the

brethren, especiaily to the poor and forgotten’’

(n.164).

This is a grandiose duty and all of us are called

to make our contribution. A building consists of
many stones. Its construction is the resuit of the
joint effort of him who formed the idea and him who
put the pians into practice.

3. So it is with the church, as we see today. The

great constructor of the church is God. He formed

the idea and continues to give it iife. But the

stones are those who serve as dociie and ready

instruments for the Hoiy Spirit’s action and who

transmit this marvelious inheritance of faith. Now it
is for you to extend it, so that the coming of God’s

reign may be a reaiity.

What service can be more beautifui than that of

the catechist who announces the divine word and

joins in iove, confidence and respect with his

brother so as to heip him to discover and realize

God’s providential designs in this regard?

72



Yet at the same time it is an extremeiy hard and
deiicate task. This is so because catechesis is not
simpiy teaching, but is the transmission of a

message of iife, the iike of which it wiii never be
possible to find in other expressions of human
thought, however sublime.

When we say “message” we mean something
more than a doctrine. How many doctrines after all
never succeed in becoming messages.

A message is not limited to putting out ideas. It

demands a response, since it is an interpellation, a
query from one person to another, he who gives
the message and he who answers it.

A message is life. Christ announced the good

news, salvation and happiness: “How blest are the

poor in spirit, blest the meek, blest the

persecuted...” (Cf. Mt 5, 3-1 1); and again, “I leave

you my peace, I give you my joy” (cf. Jn 14, 27;

5,11).

The multitudes listened to him because they saw

hope and fullness of life in him (cf. Jn. 10, 10).

In addition to that, it is necessary to respect this

divine message, for man is not the judge of God’s
word and work (cf. “Catechesi Tradendae,” nn.

17,29,30,49,52,58,59). Man ought to respect it by
keeping himself faithful, to Christ above all, to his

truth, to his commandment — otherwise there will
be alteration, betrayal — and faithful to man, for
whom the Lord’s word and message are intended
— not man in the abstract, imaginary man, but
concrete man who lives in time, with his dramas,

his hopes. It is to this man that the Gospel ought to

be announced, so that in it and through it he may

receive strength from the Holy Spirit to realize

73



himself fully in the integrity of his being and his

vaiues.

Consequentiy, the effectiveness of catechesis

wiii iargely depend on this capacity to give a

meaning, a Christian meaning, to everything that

makes up man’s iife in his time, as man among

men, citizen among citizens.

4. As for the theme of catechesis, you know that

the church’s thought on the matter was ampiy

expressed in the recent apostolic exhortation

“Catechesi Tradendae.” I wiil not try to repeat

what is said in that document. However, i would

call your attention to a few points as they touch

more neariy on the needs of the church in Brazii.

Catechesis in the family: Nothing can come

before this. It lays the basis in the child’s early

years of life of what his future may be. Therefore

his parents ought to understand the importance of

their mission in this regard. By virtue of their

baptism and matrimony they are their children’s

first catechists. Educating the young is actually

really a continuation of the act of begetting them.

In our age God comes particularly “through the
part played by the family’’ (“General Catechetical

Directory,’’ 79).

Children need to know and to see that their

parents love each other, that they respect God,

that they know how to explain the first truths of the
faith (cf. “Catechesi Tradendae,” n. 36), that they

know how to present “the Christian content”

through testimony and perseverance in “daily life

lived according to the Gospel.” (ibid. n. 68)

74



Testimony is fundamentai. God’s word is

efficacious in itseif, but it takes on concrete

meaning when it becomes reaiity in the person
announcing it. To a chiid there is no distinction

between a praying mother and prayer. More, such

prayer has special value because it is the mother’s

prayer.

Beloved parents listening to me, do not permit

your children to come to individual, social and
professional maturity while remaining children in

matters of religion. It is not true to say that faith is

an option for adult age. True option presupposes

knowledge. There can never be choice among
things that have not been wisely and adequately

expounded.

Catechist parents, the church has confidence in

you, she hopes much from you.

In addition, I would strongly recommend parish

catechesis. The parish is where catechesis can

deploy all its richness. There, associated with the

hearing of the word, prayer, celebration of the

Eucharist and the other sacraments, fraternal

communion and the exercise of charity, the

Christian mystery is announced and lived. There is

pressing need for each parish to become a place

where catechesis will take up most attention and

the parish rediscover its “own vocation. This

vocation is that of being a family house, a fraternal

and welcoming home where the baptized and the

confirmed may gain awareness of being people of

God ’’ (ibid. n. 67)

Then there is religious instruction in schools. A

citizen is trained at school through cultural and

professional education. Education of religious

conscience is a right of the human person. The

75



young demand to be set on the path of all

dimensions of culture. They also wish to be able to

find possibilities at school for getting to know the

fundamental problems of existence. First place

among these is taken by the problem of the
response that they ought to give to God. It is

impossible to arrive at auttentic life choices when

there is a will to disregard the religion that has so

much to say in that regard. It is likewise impossible
when there is a will to restrict religious instruction

to vague and neutral teaching. This is useless, for

it is without relation to concrete models coherent

with a people’s tradition and culture.

The church defends this duty to be in the school.

She has not thought nor does she think of

privileges. She strives for integral and ample

education and for the rights of families and

persons.

5. Finally, I would recall the great contribution

that comes to us from the means of social

communication.

We cannot fail to admire how enormously they
are developed. Culture reaches all points through

them; there are no longer barriers of space and

time. These means penetrate homes and reach the

humblest and farthest of places.

They offer many advantages. They inform
rapidly, they instruct, entertain, make men
brothers. They join rational expression with image,

with symbol, with personal contact. The word is

linked with esthetic and artistic expression.

76



Their power is such that they add power to what

they mention and take it away from what they do

not mention.

They entail a number of dangers: leveling of

culture, consequently reducing of culture,

passivity and emotivity in hearers and viewers,

impoverishment of critical sense, manipulation of

minds, hence of the impulse for evasion and

hedonism.

These defects, however, are not the fault of

technology and its means, but of man, who makes

use of them. Catechesis was until lately above all

expressed in writing. Now it is called upon more
and more to find expression through these new

instruments. The task is a big and a very

responsible one. We need to act through the
communications media and at the same time

educate in use of them (cf. “Inter Mirifica,” 3). We
shall build up the church to the degree that we
know how to work in this field.

6. Most beloved children, however substantial

and certain, catechesis would have little value if it

were not conveyed with efficient expression and

the support of these didactical aids that are today

offered in ever richer and promising forms.

Catechesis requires “ars docendi” of a special

kind, a pedagogy of its own. Ordinary information

is not enough for having that art. Often it is partial

and empirical, as may be that of any priest or

Religious or any layman or laywoman with religious

instruction.

77



Many cultural, didactic and, above all, moral
elements are necessary for giving the catechist

that prestige and effectiveness which ought to

mark him. Does not a danger perhaps exist here

that through lack of such requirements

catechetical teaching may be not only fruitless but
sometimes even harmful as well? For this reason it

is with great satisfaction that we learn that
catechesis training schools are appearing and

multiplying among you, so as to give catechists the

chance to be properly prepared in doctrine and

didactics and spirituaiity through progressive

training. So you can understand how I am full of
hope, to which i add insistent prayer, and so form

my warmest good wishes for fruitful results from all
these sensible initiatives.

Today’s Gospel speaks to us through symbols of

life and growth, which is sometimes slow, but is

constant: The seed that is cast upon the soli and

develops into an ear of corn, the grain of mustard

that grows into a bush where the birds of the air

find sheiter (cf.Mk.4,1-2; 26-32). May each and ali

of you meditate well upon the meaning of these

words of the Lord’s, and, as each lives his and her

specific vocation and mission in the church, may

you keep this iife within you and share in its

growth, so as to aid others to grow in firm and

mature faith too.

Most beioved chiidren, i speak to you with

profound affection. I give you some guidelines, but

above ali I would encourage you. May the Lord
bless you on the path that you have taken,

laudably and with joy. I recommend all of you to

Mary most holy, “mother and model of catechists’’

(“Catechesis Tradendae,” 73).

78



“What course is the world on? Where is it going? 1 am

not speaking to you here as an economist or sociologist,

but by virtue ofthe mandate and mission as universal

pastor ofthat church. . . described as ‘expert in

humanity
’

'

ADDRESS TO BUILDERS

OF A PLURALISTIC SOCIETY

Salvador. July 6, 1980

Dearest brothers and sisters,

1 . Here I am in your city, which hangs,
magnificent, over the Bay of Aii Saints, it is with

immense joy that I contempiate you gathered in

this numerous assembly at this stadium.

I greet your cardinai, Aveiar Brandao Vileia, his

coadjutor archbishop, his auxiiiary bishop, and his

ciosest coliaborators. I greet the state and city

authorities, i greet the priests, and men and

women Reiigious here present. I greet this
muititude, in which I see very dear sons and

daughters, i search your faces one by one, I grasp

your hands and offer you an embrace, in the

church we are not a shapeless and faceless mass,

we are not impersonal and unknown one to the

other. We are the people of God. We are loved, one
by one, by the Father, in the Son, through the Hoiy

Spirit. We are persons capable of responding to
the appeal of this God’s everiasting love. He has

known us always and predestined us to conformity

79



with the image of his Son. He caiied us, he justified
us, and he giorified us (Cf.Rom.8,30). So, we are
brethren, we love each other and form one sole
body.

I salute you, people of God who are in Sao
Salvador da Bahia. I greet this church, which is

eternally loved by the Lord, I greet it with words

used by St. Paul which the liturgy makes its own:

“The grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of

the Father and the communion of the Holy Spirit be
with you all” (Cf.2 Cor. 13,13)

2. This meeting is dedicated to: “Builders of a

Pluralistic Society Today.” They have come here

especially, as a sign of the extraordinarily rich

reality of human, intellectual and social powers

which Brazil represents in the world. I therefore

greet you in a particular fashion, brothers and

sisters. You make construction of society your

ideal, your honor, your daily work. Every man is a

builder of the society in which he lives. The

Second Vatican Council brought out this truth:

“The laity” it said, “must take on renewal of the

temporal order as their own special obligation. Led

by the light of the Gospel and the mind of the

church, and motivated by Christian love, let them

act directly and definitively in the temporal sphere.

As citizens they must cooperate with other

citizens, using their own particular skills and ac-

ting on their own responsibility. Everywhere and in

all things they must seek the justice characteristic

of God’s kingdom” (“Decree on the Apostolate of

the Laity,” 7).

80



In you all I see builders of the Brazil of today and

tomorrow. If Brazil has arrived within sight of the

21st century as a nation full of promise, this is

thanks to the efforts of individuals who have con-

tributed towards building up their own community,

their city and their nation by seeking their own im-

provement and the well-being due to them, their

families, and their fellow citizens. You are likewise

called to construct the future of your country, a

future of peace, prosperity and concord. That

future will be guaranteed only when all citizens, in

accordance with their responsibilities and with a

single common concern, will be able to create and
keep up social relations based on respect for the

common good that puts man, God’s creation, in the
center of all things.

i wouid vigorously emphasize this reality. I ad-

dress one and ail of you, those present and those

absent: workers and industrialists, professional

men and women and students, economists and ar-
tists, men of science and technology, artisans,
craftsmen, journalists, politicians and people on

the land, dwellers in big and small cities. All of you

in some way and to some degree are builders of

the pluralist society of today.

The word pluralist itself already tells of the com-

plexity and richness of the modern world, its

dynamism, its vitality, its continuous ascent

towards higher levels. Congratulations, men and

women who are building the world of today and of
tomorrow

3. What course is the world on? Where is it

going? I am not speaking to you here as an

81



economist or sociologist, but by virtue of the man-

date and mission as universal pastor of that

church which my unforgettable predecessor Paul
VI described as “expert in humanity.”

The grand spectacle of power and creative and

constructive capacity in man which modern
society displays arouses amazement and ad-

miration in us. No less frightening is the spectacle

of alienation to which society has very often been

reduced. On my first coming to your continent I felt
the need to say to the bishops of Latin America

assembled at Puebla, “One of the most notable

weaknesses of present civilization lies in an

inadequate vision of man. Ours is doubtless the

epoch in which there has been most writing and

talking about man, it is the epoch of humanisms

and anthropocentrisms. Yet, paradoxically, it is

also the epoch of profound anxieties in man about
his identity and destiny, and of abasement of man

to levels once unimaginable: it is the epoch when

human values are trampled down as never before”

(Opening Discourse, i,9).

There is no need to tell you, for you all know very

well, of the harm done to man by a self-sufficient

culture and technology closed to the transcendent,

man reduced to being a sheer instrument of
production, the victim of preconceived ideologies

or the cold logic of economic laws, manipulated for

utilitarian ends or group interests, that disregarded

or disregard man’s true good.

The very word “pluralism” bears a danger within

it. In a society that likes to call itself “pluralist”

there is actually a diversity of beliefs, of

ideologies, of philosophical ideas. However,

acknowledgement of this reality, this plurality.

82



does not exempt me —nor any Christian adhering
to the Qospei — from affirming what is the
necessary base, the unquestionable principle that

ought to support all activity directed toward con-

structing a society that ought to meet man’s

requirements, both on the level of material goods

and on the levelof spiritual and religious goods, a

society founded on a system of values which can

defend it from individual or collective egoism.

4.Conscious as I am of the universal mission
that has brought me among you in these days, I
have the duty to proclaim God’s word loudly:

“Unless the Lord build the house they labor in vain

who build it” (Ps.126, 1).

This is the reply that the church must give, today

above all: society may not be built without God,

without God’s help. That would be a contradiction.

God is the guarantee of a society made to man’s

measure: first because he imprinted the supreme

nobility of his image and likeness within man

(Cf.Gen. 1,26 Sqq.); then, because Jesus Christ

came to restore that image that had been stained

by sin. As “redeemer of man,” he gave it back its

the unrenounceable dignity of its origin. External

structures, international communities, states,

cities, each man’s activity, ought to lay stress upon

this reality, and give it the space it needs. Other-

wise they fall to pieces or become a facade without

a soul.

The church founded by Christ shows man of

today the path to follow for building up the earthly

city, which is the prelude to the heavenly city,

although it is not free of antipathies and con-

83



tradictions. The church shows the way to building

society to function in terms of man, in respect for

man. Its task is to bring the leaven of the Gospel

into all fields of human activity. It is in Christ that
the church is “an expert in man.”

Perusing the history of your fatherland, I could

not fail to notice that, as it carried out its mission in

other centuries, the church contributed to making

that same history, to determining the values that

constitute the cultural history of the Brazilian

people. The church is linked to your people in

such a way that to eliminate it would mean

mutilating the people’s social and cultural

patrimony. Therefore the church must go on

collaborating in construction of your society, by

discerning and nourishing aspirations for justice

and peace that it finds in individuals and in the

people, with its wisdom and its effort to promote

such aspirations. The church will respect the com-

petence of public men in these matters. It will not

claim to intervene in politics, it will not aspire to

share in managing temporal affairs. Its specific

contribution will be to fortify the spiritual and moral

bases of society, by doing what is possible for all

or any activity in the field of the common good to
go on in harmony and coherence with the direc-

tives and demands of a human and Christian ethic.

5. Still with concrete reality as the object, the

concrete task performed in common, this service is

above all a service of formation of consciences. It

means proclaiming the moral law and its demands,

denouncing errors and attacks against the moral

law and man’s dignity, upon which that law is

based; it means clarifying, convincing.

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This is what I observed in the speech at Puebia

already mentioned: “Particuiar care must be given

to forming a sociai conscience at ail levels and in

aii sectors. When injustices increase and when the
distance between rich and poor painfuiiy in-

creases too, social doctrine ought to be a vaiuable

instrument for training and action, in a creative

form, open to wide fieids of the church’s action”

(Opening Speech, 3,7).

The church does not propose a concrete

politicai or economic modei in its sociai doctrine;

but it shows the way, presents principles. And it

does so by reason of its evangeiizing mission, by

reason of the evangeiicai message, which has man

as its objective, in his eschatoiogicai dimension,

but aiso in the concrete context of his historicai

situation, today; it does so because it beiieves in

man’s dignity, as being created in God’s image, in

the dignity that is intrinsic to every man and every

woman, and every chiid, whatever be the piace

that he occupies in society.

Every man has the right to expect that society

wiii respect his human dignity and aiiow him to

maintain a life in accord with that dignity, in the

speech which i deiivered before the Organization

of American States (OAS) on Oct.7 iast year, i set

forth man as the sole criterion giving meaning and

direction to aii commitment by those responsibie

for the common good, whether simpie citizens or
vested with power.

I proposed the concrete man as the criterion, in

these words: “When there is taik of the right to iife,

to physical and moral integrity, to nourishment, to

shelter, to education, to heaith, to work, to respon-

sibie participation in the nation’s iife, the taik is of

85



the human person. And this human person often
happens to be in danger, famished, without a

decent house and work, without access to the

culturai heritage of his peopie or of mankind, and

without voice enough to make his troubles be

heard, it is necessary to give fresh life to the great

cause of ail-round development. This ought to be

done precisely by those who already enjoy those
goods in one way or another. They ought to put

themseives at the service of aii those —so
numerous on your continent — who are deprived of
these same goods to a degree which is at times

dramatic” (Speech to the OAS, Oct.6, 1979, n.5).

6. Putting man in the center of ail social activity

therefore means feeling concern at every injustice

because it offends man’s dignity. Taking man as
the criterion means committing oneseif to tran-

sformation of every unjust situation and reality, so

as to turn them into eiements for a just society.

That was the message which I directed to the

authorities of this country; this is the message that

I presented to the workers of Sao Paulo. This is

aiso the message that i bring to you today, buiiders

of society who are listening to me here, in Sao
Saivador da Bahia.

Every society ought to estabiish a just sociai or-

der uniess it wishes to be destroyed from within.

This appeal is not a justification of the ciass

struggie — for the ciass struggle is destined to
steriiity and destruction — but it is an appeai to a
nobie struggie for the sake of sociai justice

throughout society.

86



You all, who have taken the name of builders of
society, have a certain power in your hands,

because of your positions, your situations, or your

activities. Use that power in the service of sociai

justice. Reject that kind of reasoning which is in-

spired by the coliective egoism of a group or of a

ciass or is based on the motivation of one-sided

material profit. Reject violence as means of

resolving the problems of society, since vioience is

contrary to life, it destroys man. Appiy your power,

be it political, economic or culturai, to the service

of soiidarity embracing the whole of man, in the

first place men and women who are most in need,
whose rights are most frequently violated. Put

yourselves on the side of the poor, in consistency

with the church’s teaching, on the side of all who
in some way are the most deprived of spirituai or

materiai goods, to which they have a right.

“How blessed are the poor in spirit” (Matt. 5,3).
Blessed are they who know how to save their
human dignity in the midst of want. But biessed

aiso are they who do not iet themseives be

possessed by their possessions, who do not ailow
their sense of social justice to be stifled by at-

tachment to their goods. Truiy blessed are the poor

in spirit!

7. in presenting this message of justice and iove

to you the church is true to its mission and aware

of serving the good of society, it does not consider

that it is its task to enter into political activities, but

it knows that it is at the service of the good of

mankind. The church does not combat power, but

proclaims that power is for the good of society and

87



the safeguarding of society’s sovereignty, that

power is necessary. And that oniy this justifies
it.The church is convinced that it is its right and its

duty to promote a sociai pastorate, that is, to exert

an influence, through the means proper to it, so
that society may become more just, thanks to joint,
decided, but always peaceful action on the part of

all citizens.

So I will speak to all who in some sector of
society are builders of this society and to whom
my word reaches, with the church’s word, here in
Salvador or any other part of Brazil.

To you chiefly who have special responsibilities

because of your position and power as Christians.

To you political leaders or militants I would

remind you that the political act par excellence is

that of being coherent with a moral calling and true

to an ethical conscience which, above and beyond

personal or group interests, has the common good
of all citizens in view.

I speak to you, educators, who have the task of

explaining to the young and holding a dialogue

with them about the values through which they in

their turn will become builders of society. I ask you

to base your work on solid foundations and in-

culcate a sense of the dignity of the human person

in our youth.

Entrepreneurs, traders and industrialists, I

exhort you to put man first in your plans and

projects, that man who is a builder of society,

through his labor and the produce of his hands and

his wits. He is first a builder of his own family, then

of broader communities. Do not forget that every

man has a right to work, not only in cities and in

88



great industrial concentrations but in the coun-

tryside as well.

Men of science, technicians, I have the right to
remind you: that the ethical always takes first

place over the technical and man over things.

To you, workers, I have to say: construction of

society is not the task only of those who control
the economy, industry and agriculture. You build

society also with your sweat, for your children and

for the future. If you have the right to say your say

about economic and industrial activity, you also

have the duty to shape what you say according to

the demands of the moral law, which is justice,

dignity, and love.

For you, specialists in communications, I have a

request: do not shackle the soul of the masses

with the power that you hold, by sifting information

and by exclusively promoting the consumer

society, where abundance is accessible only to a

minority. Be above all spokesmen for man, his

rightful demands and his dignity. Be instruments of

justice, of truth, and of love. Defend what is human

and give man access to full truth.

8.Yes, brothers and sisters, building society is

first of all a matter of acquiring a conscience; not

in the exclusive sense of gaining knowledge of the

results of a certain situation analysis or survey of

the evils of society, but in the full meaning of the

word, that is forming one’s consciousness ac-

cording to the demands of God’s law, of Christ’s

message about man, of the ethical dimension of all

human enterprise.

Building up society means committing oneself,

taking the side of conscience,of the principles of

89



justice, of brotherhood, of love, against the in-

tentions of egoism, vt/hich spoils brotherhood, and

hatred, which destroys.

Building society means going beyond barriers,
divisions, oppositions, so as to work together. Man
has the capacity to open to others. Christ asks us

in a stunning way, “Who is my brother?” No lasting
and truly human work is possible unless it be
made for all, through collaboration by all vital for-
ces in society,through interchange among all men
and women, without distinction of social position

or economic situation.

Finally, building society means continual con-

version of self, revision of one’s attitudes, so as to

detect sterile prejudices and discover one’s own

errors, in order to open up to the imperatives of a

conscience formed in the light of the dignity of

every human person, as was revealed and con-

firmed by Jesus Christ. It means opening heart and

spirit so that justice, love and respect for man’s

dignity and destinies may penetrate thought and

inspire action.

9. The church, that “expert in mankind,” offers

its collaboration for building up a world to man’s

measure. But it also calls for your full, sincere,

generous collaboration, without ulterior intentions.

It depends on each and every one of you

whether the future of Brazil is to be a future of

peace, whether Brazilian society is to be life

together in justice. I believe that the time has come
for every man and every woman in this immense
country to resolve to use the wealth of their talents

90



and consciences decidedly for giving life to the

nation on a basis that shall guarantee development

of social realities and structures in justice. Anyone

who reflects on the reality of Latin America, as it

presents itself at this moment, is led to agree with

the statement that the realization of justice on this

continent faces a clear dilemma: either it will come
through profound and courageous reforms, ac-

cording to principles that express the supremacy

of the diginity of man, or itwill come — but without
lasting result and without benefit for man, of this I

am convinced —through the forces of violence.
Each one of you must feel that he is being

challenged by this dilemma. Each one of you must

make his choice at this historic hour.

Brothers and sisters, my friends be not afraid to
look ahead, to go forward,to set off for the year

2000. A new world must arise. In God’s name and

man’s, do not refuse. The church expects much

from you. “Will you, together with me, build the

world, raise it, make it better and more worthy of

you and your brethren, who are my brethren?” Do
not frustrate Christ’s expectation. Do not disap-

point the hopes of man, your contemporary.

In this immense but stupendous effort, know that

the pope is with you, prays for you, has you in his

heart, and, in Christ’s name, blesses you.

91



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“It is not enough effectively to have land in abundance,

as happens here in your beloved Brazil. One needs ajust

legislation in agrarian matters in order to be able to say

he has a society corresponding to the will of God, as

much as regards the land as the requirements ofthe

dignity ofthe human person, ofall human persons who

live on it.
' ’

HOMILY AT MASS IN RECIFE

Recife. July 7, 1980

Dear brothers and sisters, especially you,

peasants of the Northeast, and, through you, the

peasants of all Brazil:

1 . My first word is very simple but it arises from
an impulse of the heart. It is a word of very cordial

greeting to you. I greet you who are here, at the

cost of I know not what sacrifices. You certainly

came drawn by faith and with a desire to hear the

vicar of our Lord Jesus Christ. This gesture does

not surprise me, for I have long known of the great

religious spirit that is in you.

I greet you who could not be here in spite of your

great desire. I hope that my voice will be able to
reach you at least by radio.

For my part I would gladly greet you one by one,
but you will understand how that is totally im-

possible. But be certain, at least, as if I were telling

each of you singly, that the pope feels great con-

cern for you, he knows and values what you are

93



doing, he loves you as true children and he is

happy to be able to have this meeting.

It is not enough effectively to have land in abun-

dance, as happens here in your beioved Brazii.

One needs a just legisiation in agrarian matters in
order to be able to say he has a society correspon-

ding to the will of God, as much as regards the
land as the requirements of the dignity of the

human person, of ali human persons who live on it.
One needs legislation which may carry out and
serve the good of ali men and not oniy the interests
of minorities or individuais.

In addition to the abundance of iand and an

adequate iegislation one must achieve, above ali,

good wili and a sincere conversion of many to man

in his transcendent fullness.

The man of the fields Identifies himseif with his
work, with the land, from which fiows the

sustenance of so many, even in the great cities. He
piants deep roots there, which indelibly mark his

being. To tear him away from his native land, to

shove him toward an uncertain exodus in the

direction of the great metropolis or not to guaran-

tee his rights to the iegitimate possession of iand

means to violate his rights as a man and as a son

of God.

It means to introduce a dangerous
disequilibrium into society. In addition, measured

and human integrai development means to guaran-

tee always in balanced conditions both the

technologicai and industriai progress of a nation

and the priority of attention to agriculturai

questions, so indispensabie in our times in the am-

biance of an independent, harmonious and just

society. In this aspect I limit myself to calling at-

94



tention to the directives of my predecessor, John

XXlii, in the encyciicai, “Mater Et Magistra.”

“Where are you going?” I asked this question

on various stops of my apostoiic visit to Brazii. I
want to repeat it here for you and with you, for aii

those who in whatever measure are part of the
responsibiiity for the rurai worid and for the com-

mon good. “Where are you going?” May the repiy
be a courageous, firm, inspiring attitude of

Christian vaiues in defense of the promotion of the

rights of man, of the men of the fieid as weli as
those associated with them every day in life and in

the construction of a society more just and

therefore more human.

2. And why this meeting with the peasants of the

Northeast? First of aii because they play a role of

enormous importance in Braziiian society today

and deserve a word of stimuius and en-

couragement from him who has received the
mission of being universai pastor of the church.

Then, because you have to face particuiariy pain-

fui situations of living on the margins of society:

penury, undernourishment, unheaithy conditions,

iliiteracy, insecurity.

You therefore have the right to a word of comfort,

hope and guidance, such as a father owes in a

particuiar way to his more abandoned sons and

those most tried by iife. He cannot go through

Brazii without addressing his words to you.

3. It is a secret to no one that the worid is today

passing through a difficult hour in its history.

Grave probiems weigh upon aii sectors of the lives

95



of peoples and nations, on the agricultural sector

particularly. I had occasion to say on my visit to
the headquarters of the United Nations Food and

Agricultural Organization that agriculture is a sec-

tor that has “been maintained too long on the

margin of progress in living standards. It is a sec-

tor touched in a particularly painful manner by the

rapid and profound social and cultural changes of

our time. They bring out the injustices inherited

from the past, they disestablish people, families

and societies, they pile up frustrations and oblige

massive and chaotic migrations to take place”

(Nov. 12, 1979, No. 2).

I follow with endless interest the convergent ef-

forts of all good wills. I never let an occasion go

without taking care to support them with prayer,

with words, with my personal commitment. I do so
in hope that these efforts in the domain of

agriculture will arrive at the best solutions with a

view to the personal well-being of every man and

woman in respect for the requirements of the com-
mon good.

The considerations that I now go on to express

at our gathering here are dictated by one sole pur-

pose; On the basis of the church’s own mission

and the role proper to her, as far as possible

reflect them in the light of the church’s

magisterium in the social field and so try to

“establish the human community according to the

divine law” (cf. “Gaudium Et Spes,” No. 42). In this

way, with the power of the Spirit, which is the only

power that the church has, and with full respect for

the autonomy of temporal power, but with con-

sciousness of her responsibilities, the church will

not be lacking in an effort “to make human life ever

96



more human,” to arouse consciences and “make

every element of his life correspond to man’s true

dignity” (“Redemptor Hominis,” No. 14).

4. When we reflect seriously and calmly about
man and human life together in society,
enlightened and strengthened by God’s word and

the church’s teaching since the beginning, such

reflection tells us that the earth, the land, is a gift

from God. It is a gift that he makes to all human

beings, both men and women, that he wills all

human beings to be fathered in one sole family and

that they should relate with one another in the

spirit of fraternity (cf. “Gaudium Et Spes,” No. 24).

Therefore it is not licit, because it is not in ac-

cord with God’s design, to use this gift in such a

way that its benefits are to the advantage of only a

few, while others, the immense majority, remain

excluded. The imbalance is graver, and the in-

justice inherent therein cries louder, when that im-

mense majority is condemned by that same state

of affairs to a situation of want, poverty and life on

the margins of society.

The very right to property is legitimate in itself,

but in a Christian view of the world it must perform

its function and respect its social end (cf. Speech

to the Indian peasants at Cuilapan, Mexico, Jan.

28, 1979). So, in the use of goods possessed, the

general destination given them by God and the

requirements of the common good prevail over the
advantage, sometimes even over what are not

primary necessities, of private origin. This is true

as well — as I have already had the opportunity to

97



say -- when it is a question of the rurai world and

cultivation of the land, because the land was put at

man’s disposal by God.

We have just been listening to a reading from
the first chapter of the Book of Genesis. In it God
says, “Fill the earth and subdue it...

I
give you every

seed-bearing plant...and every tree that has seed-

bearing fruit on it to be your food” (Gen. 1 ,28-30).

The earth is man’s because God entrusted it to

him, and man masters it through his labor (cf. Gen.

1,28). So it is not admissible that in the general

development of a society men and women who live
in a rural area should be excluded from the true

progress worthy of man. They are those exactly

who are ready to make the earth productive
through the toil of their hands and are much in

need of land for feeding their families.

The Second Vatican Council of 15 years ago

was the church taking account of herself and of

the world. The council made reference exactly to

the question with which we are concerned. It

proclaimed: “In many areas, too, farmers ex-

perience special difficulties in raising products or

in selling them. ..Country people must be

helped. ..Otherwise. ..they will remain in the con-

dition of lower-class citizens” (“Gaudium Et Spes,”

No. 66). It is not unthinkable that they may be

reduced to even poorer circumstances.

A fundamental principle of the church’s thought

is that social organization is for service to man and

not the contrary. This principle holds good for all

and always. It applies chiefly to those who have

received a mandate from society to guarantee the

good of all.

98



The initiatives that they take ought to be

initiatives for man’s sake when they concern the

agricultural sector. They ought to be so at the

lawmaking ievel and on the level of the judiciary as

well as on the level of safeguarding citizen’s rights.

A situation where the popuiation — that of the rurai
area, too -- sees its human dignity being

disrespected is a situation that leads to ruin

because it ieaves the field open to other initiatives

inspired by hatred and by vioience.

5. Workers on the land like workers in any other

branch of production are above aii human persons.

They ought always to remain such in their own and

others’ eyes on the level of ideas and in the prac-

tical order. They must have possibilities for

reaiizing the potentials contained in their being,

possibiiities for “being more’’ and at the same time

being treated in accordance with their human

dignity. Since “work is for man and not man for
work,” a fundamental requirement whoiiy respect-

ful of his dignity is that he should be able to draw

necessary and sufficient means from his iabor for

meeting his famiiy and social responsibilities

decently. Man is never a mere “instrument” of
production.

Thus, in a weil-ordered politicai community

justice and humanity do not go together with, and

cannot be reconciied with, a certain abuse of

iiberty on the part of some. This abuse is linked

exactiy with a consumerist manner of behavior. It

is not controlied by ethics, since it simuitaneousiy

limits others’ liberty, that is, the liberty of those

who suffer notorious want and find themseives

99



being pushed down into conditions of further
misery and need (of. “Redemptor Hominis," 16) in

a gigantic version of the bibiical parabie of the rich

man and the poor man Lazarus (of. Lk. 16,19-31).

in that parabie Christ does not condemn the rich
man because he is rich or because he garbs him-
self luxuriously. He strongly condemns the rich
man who had no consideration for poor Lazarus’
state of penury, when Lazarus desired only to feed
on crumbs falling from the festive table. Christ

does not condemn simple possession of material

goods. But his harshest words are for those who
use their wealth in a egotistical way, without

bothering about their neighbor who lacks what is
necessary for him.

With those words Christ puts himself on the side

of human dignity, on the side of those whose

dignity is not respected, on the side of the poor.

“How blessed are the poor in spirit, the reign of
God is theirs” (Mt. 5,3). Yes, blessed are the poor,

the poor in material goods who yet keep their

dignity as men and women. Blessed are the poor,

those who for Christ’s sake have a special feeling

for the brother or sister who suffers need, for the

neighbor who suffers so many privations, including

hunger, through lack of work, through the im-

possibility of bringing bring up his children in a

worthy fashion.

Blessed are the poor, who know how to detach

themselves from their possessions and their power

so as to put them at the service of the needy, to

commit themselves to the search for a just social

order, to promote those changes of attitudes that

are necessary for those on society’s margins to

find a place at the human family’s table.

100



It is imperatively necessary that there be no

privileged social strata in respect to goods of

prime necessity: food, ciothing, sheiter, medicai

and sociai assistance, basic education,

professionai training, transportation, information,

entertainment possibiiities, reiigious iife. it is

iikewise necessary for there to be no outstanding

inequaiities between urban and rurai enrivonments

and that, where such are created, adequate

measures shaii be rapidiy applied to eiiminate or

reduce them wherever possibie. One and aii must

feel committed to this, individuais, sociai groups

and public authorities at ali ieveis.

6. Workerson the iand, and other workers as

weli, may not under any pretext be deprived of the

right to participate and communicate responsibiy

in the life of undertakings and organizations in-

tended for defining and safeguarding their in-

terests, iikewise in the hard and dangerous march

toward indispensabie transformation of the struc-

tures of economic iife, aiways for man’s sake.

Such active presence on the part of workers at

these various sociai ieveis to which their activities

are linked aiways presupposes an economy in ser-

vice of man with aii the truth of his being a per-

sonai being. But ciashes occur whenever iiberty is

confused with the instinct of individuai or coiiec-

tive interests or with the instinct of strife and

dominion. So, in order to overcome these ciashes,

whatever the ideoiogical coiors be that mark them

out, and for such workers’ participation to be ef-

fective and constructive, there is imperative need

for previous conversion of minds, wiiis and hearts.

101



There is need for the conversion of man to the
truth about man. Knowledge and acceptance of the

truth are the basic condition for liberty. “ Then you

wiii know the truth and the truth wiil set you free”

(Jn. 8,32).

7. God’s thought regarding the relationship of

man to earth is expressed in biblical language in
these terms: “The Lord then took the man and set-

tied him in the garden of Eden, to cultivate and

care for it” (Gen. 2,15). We read in another
passage that he spoke as foiiows to the first

human couple: “Fill the earth and subdue it” have
dominion over creation (cf. Gen. 1,28).

Now “to rule” and “cultivate” the earth is the
principie that ought to be aiways observed by

mankind in administering this gift of God. This

principle lays down an absolutely obligatory line of

action for all who are responsible for and con-
cerned with the iand question: persons vested with

public powers, technicians, enterprisers and

workers.

It happens, however, that “man often seems to

see no other meaning in his naturai environment

than what serves for immediate use and con-

sumption. Yet it was the Creator’s wiil that man

should communicate with nature as an intelligent

and nobie ‘master’ and ‘guardian,’ and not as a

heedless ‘exploiter’ and ‘destroyer’” (“Redemptor

Hominis,” No. 15).

At the sight of the immense resources and mar-

velous beauties of this great nation a cry springs

from the soui: Cultivate and have care for your

beioved Brazil. Use and master its resources.

102



cause them to render more for man’s sake, the

man of today and tomorrow. Here, as regards em-

ployment of that gift of God’s which is the earth,

much thought must be given to coming
generations. A tribute must be paid, that of

austerity, so as not to weaken, reduce or, even

worse, make iiving conditions for future
generations unbearable. Justice and humanity

demand this.

8. One last word, especially for those who have

the happiness of waiking in Christ’s iight as they

work. Labor is production, the source of economic

goods, the means of gaining a iiving and so on. But

it shouid aiso be understood and lived as duty, as

iove, as a source of honor, as prayer.

This appiies to aii workers, naturaiiy, but it ap-

plies to you land workers in a special way. You are

called to render a service to men, your brethren, in

contact with nature. You work directiy with God,

the Creator and Father, in order that our planet —

Earth — may be more and more in conformity with
his designs, be the environment desired for ail

kinds of iife: of plants, of beasts, of men above all.

See, the “Lord’s are the earth and its fuilness,

the worid and those who dwell in it” (Ps. 24,1). Let

us do aii in our power as “knowing and nobie

guards” that, as it serves man, “ail on earth (may)

worship and sing praise to you, sing praise to your

name” aiways (Ps. 66,4).

I have spoken to you with an open heart for I am
aware that the church in fideiity to her Lord knows

that she must be open to human realities, must in-

103



terpret them in the light of the Gospel and cultivate

in those realities the good news. In this way she
tries to get men, when the case arises, to change

their criteria for judging, their favorite values, the

centers of their interest, their lines of thought, the

sources of their inspiration and their life models,

when these are in contrast with God’s designs (cf.

“Evangelii Nuntiandi,” 19).

9. It is known that initiatives on a vast scale are

being planned and put into practice in this country

for agriculture. May it please God that a Christian
humanism will always enlighten them, a true sense

of man. Man is one and all of you and every one of

those whom you represent here with your dignity
as persons and children of God. There is an im-

posing necessity for promptness and profundity in

facing a situation of which your silence tells with

great eloquence. Do not let your moral and

religious dignity ever be abased by acceptance of

feelings such as hatred or desire for violence.

Amen and peace!

Raise your eyes to your Father and Lord of all. It

is he that will give each the reward of what he

does.

I pray for those other brothers of ours, I pray for

you and with you, dear land worker brothers and

sisters, in your name and in God’s name, that there

will be efforts at collaboration and concord, that all

who have responsibility and are interested in the

well-being of every man will seek and apply real,

fitting and effective measures for satisfying the

rights of the man on the land, so as to aid him. I

104



refer to public authorities at national, state and

local levels, to groups, organizations and aii men of

good wiil, with the church’s specific contribution in

carrying out her mission, in this matter, whoever

has more must feel more obliged to cooperate.

We are the famiiy of the children of God. As your
brother, I would say this to you, beloved peasants

of Brazil: You are worth much. Preserve your

human and religious weaith: love for the family,

your sense of friendship and loyalty, your oneness

with the most needy among you, your respect for

the laws and for all that is rightful in social living,

your love for good harmony and peace, your trust

in God and your openeness to the supernatural,

your devotion to Our Lady, and more besides.

Here, before a church dedicated to her under a

title most dear to me -- that of Our Lady of Mount
Carmel -- I pray to God through Our Lady that he

may assist, comfort and help us all.

With my apostolic blessing.

105



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"The spread of culture, the critical spirit, the publicity

given to all questions and debates require fuller and

deeper knowledge of the faith. Popular religion itself

ought to be nourished with ever more extensive explan-

ation of revealed truth, and it ought to be freed from

elements that make it seem inauthentic.
' ’