VATICAN CITY, NOV 24, 2000 (VIS) - More than 500 members of the International Union of Catholic Jurists were welcomed by Pope John Paul this morning in the Clementine Hall where, in his address to them, he stressed that their "Catholic character is not a sign of separation of closing, but rather a sign of openness and a manifestation of the service which jurists wish to render to the entire human community."
Addressing the jurists as they celebrate their Jubilee, the Pope went on to say that "we must, however, recognize that the danger of particularism weighs on law. If, on the one hand, particularism acts legitimately to safeguard the specific genius of each people and each culture, often on the other hand, ... it involves not only separations but also situations of unjustified rift and conflict."
The Holy Father underscored that "law is born of a deep human need which is present in all men, .... the need for justice, which is the realization of a balanced order of interpersonal and social relations, suitable for guaranteeing that each person has his due and no one is deprived of what is his due."
"Recognizing the good of everyone and promoting it," he added, "is a specific duty for all men. The order of justice is not a static order, but a dynamic one, precisely because the life of individuals and communities is itself dynamic. ... (This order) demands the continual and passionate exercise of wisdom, what the Latins called 'iurisprudentia', a wisdom which engages all of as person's energies and whose exercise constitutes one of the most noble virtuous practices of man. The possibility of giving one's due not only to relatives, friends, fellow citizens or brothers in the faith, but to every human being, simply because he or she is a person, simply because justice demands it, this is the honor of law and of jurists."
"It is law," said the Pope, "which shows the unity of mankind and the equality between all human beings."
Noting "the efforts of the international community in recent decades to proclaim, defend and promote basic human rights," he affirmed that jurists should be among the first to defend these rights. He stated that "our world needs men and women of courage, who publicly oppose the countless violations of rights" and who "denounce all situations where human dignity is disdained."
In particular Pope John Paul decried those situations where people are juridically deprived of freedoms of thought and of religion, and where "legislators or magistrates have lost the awareness of the specific juridical and social value of the family or where they show themselves ready to put other forms of life in common on the same legal level." He also denounced legislation recognizing a "pretended right" to abortion and euthanasia. Both of these, he asserted, deprive people of the most basic of human rights, the right to life.
"Law which detaches itself from anthropological and moral foundations carries within it many dangers," said the Holy Father in conclusion. "For the world of jurisprudence, it is important to pursue a hermeneutical path and to constantly bring the foundations of law to the mind and conscience of everyone."
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