VATICAN CITY (CNS): Linking terrorist attacks in the United States to social injustices like poverty, Pope John Paul II called for an urgent overhaul in political and economic relations between countries, coupled with “radical personal and social renewal”.
World leaders today must work “more than ever and in a more intense way – through dialogue and international co-operation – for the eradication of all that is a source of conflict and tensions between peoples and nations,” the Pope told 10 new ambassadors to the Vatican on December 6.
The ambassadors represented Bangladesh, Djibouti, Finland, Eritrea, Georgia, Lesotho, Rwanda, Mauritius, Mali and Switzerland.
The Pope said people around the world today “are marked more than ever by fear, which coincides with the unstable situation our world knows and the uncertainty of tomorrow”.
“Many people seem unable to envisage their future serenely, notably the young people who are troubled by the dramatic events that the world of the adults offers them,” he said.
But handling the immediate “far-reaching emergency” should not distract world leaders from crucial long-term steps to prevent violence, which include disinterested development aid to poor countries and defence of the sacredness of human life, he said.
