MAN, NOT MONEY OR TECHNOLOGY, IS PROTAGONIST OF DEVELOPMENT

VATICAN CITY, APR 26, 2002 (VIS) - The Holy Father has sent a Message to the young people of FUCI, the Italian Catholic University Federation, on the eve of their national congress on the theme "Solidarity in the Network of Interdependencies."

The Pope noted that their theme touches upon "the progressive intensification of relations among peoples, a phenomenon that is described today by the term 'globalization'. ... The growing interdependence among peoples, while it calls for a refusal of terrorism and violence as a practical way to build the essential conditions of justice and freedom, demands above all a strong moral, cultural and economic solidarity and a political organization of international society that can guarantee the rights of all peoples."

"The solution to the evil of underdevelopment and the dramatic situations in which millions of people live and die," wrote John Paul II, "is fundamentally of an ethical nature, and to it must correspond coherent economic and political choices. ... It is man who is the protagonist of development, not money or technology."
He said, in conclusion, that there must also be "a reform of international trade and the global financial system, but everyone is called to assume precise commitments according to their own possibilities, modifying when necessary, their own lifestyle in order to attain a development that is marked by fairness and solidarity."

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