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INTENTION : |
That all may promote authentic economic development that respects the dignity of peoples.
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It may seem strange to some people that, well into the 21st century, the Pope invites us to pray that economic development may be promoted. The time is ripe for everyone, men and women of this world, to seek and desire to live better. We cannot deny the advances in technology and social structures that have allowed us to live with better health, greater security, for more years! But this only happens in some 'urban islands' of our globalized world. Sadly, we hear news from places where there is not sufficient food, there is not security, there is not health assistance, where some people are dying of common diseases or of hunger. Each year in his message on World Food Day the Pope reiterates the same difficulties, the same aspirations, the same pleas for world organizations to prioritize the human dignity of every individual person, in the context of some particular wish. 'Certainly, in face of the death of whole communities through hunger and forced abandonment of their countries of origin, immediate aid is essential, but intervention in the medium and long term is also needed, so that international activity is not limited solely to responding to emergencies.' (Benedict XVI, Message to the FAO, 2011)
For that reason we ought to pray more than ever, with the Pope, that all those with responsibility for the economy and government decisions may promote authentic economic development. We know it is not easy, so we should include each one of these leaders in our prayer. Economics is not a simple science; it is, as it were, an art. Like a clock full of inter-related cogs that have to be perfectly synchronized by the watchmaker so that they may tell the exact time. Each one of the elements in the economy is inter-related in a way that makes them work so that development may be real for all, and it needs a very precise balance. Inflation, work, growth, production, consumption, investmentˇK all are wheels in the same clock, which have to be coordinated to give the correct result.
And, most important:the watchmaker, the human being, full of his own interests, preoccupations, virtues and sins. 'In fact the economy and finance, being instruments, may be used badly when the person managing them has only self-interested motives' (Caritas in Veritate, 36). So let us pray that all persons working for the development of national economies may give priority to the dignity of all people in the world, so that their actions may reach everyone, and not just those nearest to them. It is vital to ask the Lord to touch everyone's hearts, including our own, to collaborate by our honest actions, in solidarity, so that economic development may be a reality in every corner of the universe.
"If the international community wishes to act really 'unitedly' against hunger, it is necessary to overcome poverty by means of authentic human development, based on the idea of the person as unity of body, soul and spirit. Today, on the contrary, there is a tendency to limit the vision of development to the satisfaction of the person's material needs, especially through access to technology; authentic development is not simply about what a person 'has', but should be open to the higher values of fraternity, solidarity and the common good.'(Benedict XVI, Message to the FAO, 2010).
Fr. Francisco Gismondi, sj
Works in Rome in the General Treasury of the Society of Jesus
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