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The European continent is going through a crucial phase in its history. In the space of four days, two countries recently rejected the draft European Constitution: first France, and then Holland. What is meant by that “no”, and what could happen as a result? Let us be honest: that “no” is especially a reflex of fear and of a rejection. If it be a rejection of the necessary solidarity between the European states themselves on the one hand, and between Europe and the rest of the world on the other, or if it be a desire to protect more vigorously our achievements and lifestyle, it is a tragic rejection and marks the end of the importance of Europe and, in the last analysis, of its well-being. Our well-being cannot be promoted or preserved without the promotion and improvement of the well-being of humanity as a whole. Only on the day that humanity as a whole is happy and at peace shall we be happy and at peace. For to construct our happiness and our security by sheltering behind barriers is increasingly felt as an injustice, if not as an insult, by the world of the southern hemisphere, the world of the poor and the hungry. Younger than we, having nothing to lose, they will end up by submerging us. Unfortunately the premonitory signs are already before our eyes: immigration and terrorism. Both emphasize the fact that the situation of imbalance of the world cannot generate peace and security and that the repercussions in terms of defence and protection do not constitute an adequate response to this imbalance. Not even the highest of walls shall ever protect us completely. Only the sharing of the goods of the earth, an equal sharing, can give rise to cohabitation in security. If however it be a desire for an even greater solidarity, of a more social Europe, with a vocation of further extending social peace to the whole earth, then an inspiring, but at the same time exacting task awaits us, in the sense that it demands of each of us a change of route in the way of conducting our life. To put it simply, I would say simply this: We cannot hope to vanquish the wretched and intolerable poverty in which half of humanity is forced to live (living on less than two euros per day), so long as the richest inhabitants of the planet dream of becoming even richer! We would like the poor to stop being poor but without us stopping being rich. That is impossible. The earth does not have the means to offer our (overall) level of life to everyone. I say overall level because, even among us in Europe, the gap between rich and poor never stops growing wider. This level of life, above all, is so high that it dramatically squanders and exhausts the earth’s resources. It is up to each one of us to extricate ourselves from the lethal spiral that consists in saying: Everything I can do, I will do, everything I want, I will have. Instead let us rediscover together a dynamic of selflessness and greater sobriety of life. The Christians of Europe must face up to the task of understanding and practising the Gospel and its appeal to these new lifestyles.
