IN BRIEF

CARDINAL RENATO MARTINO, PRESIDENT of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, presided at a conference at 11:30 this morning in the Holy See Press Office, for the presentation of the volume, "Pope John Paul II and the Challenges of Papal Diplomacy." He was joined by Archbishop Andre Dupuy, apostolic nuncio in Venezuela and Msgr. Pietro Parolin, under-secretary for Relations with States. Archbishop Dupuy edited the volume which was co-published by the pontifical council and the Path to Peace Foundation. Cardinal Martino underscored "the harmonious composition of an extraordinary Magisterium that, over 26 years, has touched all aspects of the realities of our times, setting forth a vigorous series of variations on the unifying theme of the defense of human dignity and its basic rights. ... In reading the pages, and  between the lines, what emerges is the greatness, not only of a very lofty Magisterium, but of a courageous and solid faith, a hope that hopes against hope, a love for truth, for peace and for man which makes John Paul II's pontificate one of the greatest blessings that the Church and the world have received in history."

ARCHBISHOP CELESTINO MIGLIORE, HOLY SEE PERMANENT OBSERVER  to the United Nations, addressed the plenary of the 59th General Assembly of the U.N. on Item 45, the 10th Anniversary of the International Conference on Population and Development, that took place in Cairo in September 1994. The nuncio noted that "the well-being and progress of every member of the human family, ... continues to have a heightened significance in the light of the fact that the gap between the rich and the poor of the world is still widening, a situation which poses an ever-increasing threat to the peace for which humanity longs." Pointing to U.N. studies 10 years ago predicting a decrease in the global rate of population growth, he said "it is now a fact that population growth has declined appreciably in many of the industrialized developed nations, and that this decline poses a serious threat to their future."
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