Economic gap requires response by Christians, says Vatican official

Social Justice News
September 8, 2008

Economic gap requires response by Christians, says Vatican official

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Poverty, particularly the growing gap between the world's rich and poor, is one of the most dramatic situations the world is facing and requires a response by Christians as well as by governments, said Cardinal Renato Martino.

The cardinal, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, announced that his office is preparing a document on "poverty in the age of globalization."

Vatican Radio reported Sept. 2 that the cardinal made the announcement during a late-August visit to Tanzania, where he hosted a continentwide presentation on the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church.

"The commitment to organizing and structuring society in such a way as to ensure one's neighbor does not find himself in poverty is an indispensable act of charity," said the cardinal.

The obligation to work for the eradication of poverty is especially binding, he said, "when a boundless number of people and even whole populations" are sinking further into poverty while the world's wealthiest people get richer.

He said the situation has assumed "the proportions of a truly global social question."

"Poverty -- especially the growing inequality between regions, between continents and between countries and within countries -- constitutes the most dramatic problem facing the world," he said.

Cardinal Martino said the Gospel calls Christians to imitate Jesus and "give preference to the poor, addressing our energy and resources to the poor, and to contemplating the renewal of society beginning with the needs of the poor."

While he did not say when he expected the new document to be completed, he said it would "indicate a Gospel approach to combating poverty" and raise Catholics' consciousness about poverty, especially the fact that women and children form the biggest portion of the extremely poor people in the world.

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