The 44th Social Week of Italian Catholics” “” “
A point of arrival but also one of departure, the Social Week of Italian Catholics, held in Bologna from 7 to 10 October, represented for the Italian Church and laity the end-result of a long process of gestation, which comprised various seminars, conferences, and round tables, leading up to the publication of a preparatory document entitled like the Week itself “Democracy. New scenarios, new powers”. Some forty speakers and over 1,200 delegates from dioceses, associations and universities all over Italy debated this theme. THE POPE REMINDS CATHOLICS OF THEIR “VOCATION” TO POLITICS. The discussions of the Social Week opened in the light of the message sent by JOHN PAUL II, who exhorted the laity to become protagonists in political and institutional life: “It cannot be forgotten says the Pope in his message that the knowledge and putting into practice of the social doctrine of the Church, and hence participation in the political life of the country, according to the methods and procedures of the democratic system, form an intrinsic part of the vocation of the laity”. According to the Pope, reflection on democracy cannot today be “limited to merely considering political systems and institutions, but must enlarge its own horizon to the problems posed by the development of science and technology, to those induced in the sector of the economy and finance by the spread of globalization, to the new rules for the government of international organizations, and to the questions posed by the growing and rapid development of the world of communication, in order to formulate a genuine and complete model of democracy”. But political action is also called to come to terms with “a higher ethical authority, illuminated in turn by an integral view of man and society”. These appeals formed the focal point round which the debates and round tables were organized and the over 100 interventions of participants concentrated. TERRORISM AND CONFLICTS: “WORDS OF PEACE FROM THE CHURCH”. Democratic rules, ethics and anthropology, value of peace, defence of life, role of conscience and culture: these were some of the essential points of the keynote address entrusted by the organizing Committee to the jurist FRANCESCO PAOLO CASAVOLA, former President of Italy’s Constitutional Court and now president of the Istituto dell’Enciclopedia Italiana. He made a powerful appeal to the value of peace, also in relation to the current international situation: “The idea that one can and should remove the life of one’s adversary, or the person who symbolically represents reasons opposed to one’s own, must be stripped of any residual, archaic and inhumane justification”. According to Casavola. “the danger is that in the current phase of reaction by extremist groups in the Islamic world, every blow will be repaid in kind. The attitude of the Catholic Church to persevere in dialogue and not to despair of peace, even in the tragic situation created by fundamentalist international terrorism and the war in Iraq, ought he said to indicate a route, the only realistic one, to overcome the current crisis”. BEYOND BOLOGNA, A “WORKSHOP” FOR DEMOCRACY. The various sessions were dedicated to the relation between science and technology, economic dynamics, the influence of the mass media on democracy, and the role of Catholics in so dynamic and complex a context. In his intervention Cardinal DIONIGI TETTAMANZI, archbishop of Milan, proposed a kind of “alternative political agenda”, aimed not only at tackling some social problems, but also at “humanising” politics: “Debt must not be allowed to prostrate the debtor; access to water must be guaranteed to all; no one must lack basic necessities; peace alone is the guarantee for development; knowledge and education are essential to enable everyone to understand and ‘take part’; and children all over the world have the right to play”, said Tettamanzi, who went on to urge believers to get involved in secular life: “The Christian faith it not extraneous to, nor is it separate from, social and political problems. More specifically, it cannot be extraneous or indifferent to the question of democracy, especially considered in its foundations and its anthropological needs”. The conclusions of the Social Week were entrusted to the sociologist FRANCO GARELLI, who proposed as a “continuation” of the discussions in Bologna the “setting up of a common workshop of reflection and formation”, to provide a forum at which “specific shared projects could be discussed” and “common positions sought on public issues of major importance”.
