CANBERRA (CNS): Fratelli Tutti, on Fraternity and Social Friendship, Pope Francis’ new social encyclical offers a vision for the world of dignity for every person around the world and promotes a call to “build a new culture of fraternity and dialogue,” Archbishop Mark Coleridge of Brisbane the president of the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference said.
In a statement released as the encyclical went public on October 4, Archbishop Coleridge said the document “is not just for believers but for the entire human family.”
Explaining that in the 2015 encyclical, Laudato Si’, On Care for Our Common Home, the pope spoke of caring for creation, the archbishop said the new teaching document “speaks of care for each other, the family that dwells together in the common home.”
Bishop Georg Batzing of Limburg, Germany, president of the German Bishops’ Conference, described the encyclical as a “wake-up call” and an “urgent appeal for global solidarity and international cooperation,” the German Catholic news agency KNA reported.
Bishop Batzing also said Fratelli Tutti was about the vital need to uphold human dignity. The pope, he explained, was opposing national isolation and calling for an “ethical code in international relations.”
Christine Allen, director of CAFOD (Catholic Agency for Overseas Development), the international humanitarian aid agency of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, said, “Pope Francis is unflinching in his message” that focuses on solidarity with poor people globally.
“Politics is failing the poor,” Allen said in a statement, “and it is shameful that some political decisions that are made affect the poorest, plunging them further into poverty, suffering and despair. Politics should be about long-term change and effective solutions, not slogans and marketing.”
Archbishop Coleridge agreed with Pope Francis, saying that the conflicts that plague humanity “are a road to nowhere.”
The archbishop said, “The Holy Father speaks of ideologies that seek to divide rather than unite, policies that value certain people over others and economic systems that prioritise profit over people and the planet.”
He added that the pope “offers a grand yet simple vision of human interconnectedness.”
He said, “We’re all connected to each other in ways we scarcely image. Our task now is to work out what this means in practice as we look beyond the pandemic.”
In Germany, the bishops, Church groups and charities gave the encyclical a predominantly positive assessment.
Bishop Batzing said the document indicates that Pope Francis has not lost hope despite his “at times harshly formulated analysis of the world.”
The pope had referred to the new appreciation given to many people who had shown great commitment to serving others during the Covid-19 coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic and had in some cases given their lives, he said, adding that the pope also stressed how important dialogue between nations and religions is.
Reinhard Cardinal Marx of Munich, said the pope provided a clear analysis that the pandemic had exposed many false certainties. For example, he noted that the pope dissociated himself from the apparently tempting ideological answers to economic and social challenges given by nationalism, populism and racism. The pope also repeated his warning not to erect new borders and walls between people and nations.
Church relief organisations in Germany interpreted the encyclical as supporting people fighting against national unilateralism and an economic order geared solely toward profit and growth.
Adveniat, the German bishops’ Latin America relief agency, said Fratelli Tutti was a concrete guideline for a global reorientation, said. Misereor, the development aid agency, said the encyclical supported all those who work for the preservation of creation beyond religious and national boundaries, and who denounce human rights violations.
KNA reported that the Catholic reform group, We are the Church, called the encyclical visionary and said, “A fundamental change of course is necessary” in politics and in religious life.
At CAFOD, Allen said the pandemic demonstrated early on how people could come together in response to a common challenge. “But Francis condemns the rush to return to politics ‘as normal,’ one of self interest and indifference to the plight of those left behind,” she said.
“This is a message not just to Catholics, or people of other faiths, it is for everyone,” Allen added.
“It is a powerful voice amid the pandemic, growing inequality, conflict and racial unrest. Pope Francis’ message is clear. We cannot just switch on the reset button and go back to ‘normal’” in a post-pandemic world, she said.
