Pope blasts consumerism as human rights
threat
By Arthur Jones NCR
Staff
In his most pointed attack yet on materialist
consumerism, Pope John Paul II has equated it as an evil to rank with
Marxism, Nazism and fascism.
Within his annual Jan. 1 World Peace Day message, in which the
pontiff also sharply criticizes the inadequacies of the free market system, the
pope curtly denounces materialist consumerism as an ideology in
which the exaltation of the individual and the selfish satisfaction of
personal aspirations become the ultimate goal of life creating a
world-view in which the negative aspects on others are considered
completely irrelevant.
These condemnations of threats to human dignity are key elements
in John Pauls 10-page letter, Respect for Human Rights: the Secret
of True Peace, which focuses primarily on the need to build the common
good through observing rights as diverse as the right to life, to religious and
political freedoms, to participate in the life of the community and to
self-fulfillment.
This centurys history, the pope states, has shown the tragic
danger that results from forgetting the truth about the human person.
Before our eyes we have the results of ideologies such as Marxism, Nazism
and fascism, and also of myths like racial superiority and ethnic
exclusivism.
No less pernicious, though not always as obvious, he
emphasizes, are the effects of materialist consumerism. Also
focusing on the rapid globalization of the economy and the diminution of
national sovereignty, the pope emphasized that nations and people have
the right to share in the decisions which often profoundly modify their way of
life.
Who is responsible, he asks, for guaranteeing
the global common good and the exercise of economic and social rights? The free
market by itself cannot do this because in fact there are many human needs
which have no place in the market.
The technical details of certain economic problems give rise
to the tendency to restrict discussions about them to limited circles, with the
consequent danger that political and financial power is concentrated in a small
number of governments and special interest groups, he said. Individuals
have the right to a decent level of living and the availability of
work to make that life possible, he says. He balances relief from the the
devastating reality of unemployment between the necessity of
emergency interventions by governments and the need for the poor
themselves to take responsibility for their own livelihood.
John Paul sees some urgency in the need for a world body that has
at its center the international economic and social common good and frequently
finds ways to congratulate the work of the United Nations. He praises both the
50th anniversary of the Declaration of Human Rights and the recent
establishment of the International Criminal Court.
He might also be envisioning the United Nations as the
peoples economic forum of last resort when he states: The effects
of recent economic and financial crises have had heavy consequences for
countless people, reduced to conditions of extreme poverty. Many of them had
only just reached a position that allowed them to look forward to the future
with optimism.
Through no faults of their own, the pope continues,
they have seen these hopes cruelly dashed, with tragic results for
themselves and their children. And how can we ignore the effects of
fluctuations in the financial markets? We urgently need a new vision of global
progress in solidarity, which will include an overall and sustainable
development of society.
As he lists the personal human rights, the pope follows the
right to participate in the life of the community with a
particularly serious form of discrimination -- threats to the right to
exist -- visited on ethnic groups and national minorities.
All human beings, without exception, are equal in
dignity, stresses the pope, consequently no one can legitimately
deprive another person, no matter who they may be, of these rights.
All citizens have the right to participate in the life of
their community, says the pope, but this right means nothing when
the democratic process breaks down because of corruption and favoritism. Even
elections can be manipulated.
Environmental rights and responsibilities and the right to peace
are included. He particularly praises peace-seeking when courageous
political leaders resolve to continue negotiations even when the situation
seems impossible.
The path of dialogue, he writes, is the path
worthy of the human person.
National Catholic Reporter, January 8,
1999
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