Discover the common good
In a video message to participants in the international meeting ‘Economy of Francesco’ on November 21, Pope Francis said:
“We can think of hunger, which, as Benedict XVI rightly pointed out, “is not so much dependent on a lack of material resources as on a shortage of social resources, the most important of which are institutional.
“The social and economic crisis that many people are experiencing at first hand, and that is mortgaging the present and the future by the abandonment and exclusion of many children, adolescents and entire families, makes it intolerable for us to privilege sectorial interests to the detriment of the common good. We need to recover a sense of the common good.”
Bishops slam marijuana bill
Mexico’s Catholic bishops criticised the country’s senate for voting to legalise marijuana and appealed to the Lower House to amend the bill. They said: “The bill that was approved does not address the health damages that arise from an ever-increasing use of marijuana, does not address the effects on families due to young people’s consumption of drugs, and does not contribute to reducing and inhibiting exposure to drugs.”
They added “the demands for irresponsible liberty for a few, are placed above the common good and health”.
Praising Trump
Chaldean Archbishop Basha Warda of Irbil, Iraq, said the Trump administration was clear in support of for Iraq’s Catholics. He said the Church is not partisan, and does its best to stay out of politics. He told participants of a conference on religious freedom that there are now less than 250,000 Catholics in Iraq and they could disappear. Warda said the Trump administration was focused on helping, and expressed the hope that the Biden administration will continue to do the same.
(Compiled by Fr Joe Borg)