'Towards the Common Good': Mr. Sanders Goes to the Vatican
Published on
Friday, April 15, 2016
by
Common Dreams
'Towards the Common Good': Mr. Sanders Goes to the Vatican
'Our youth are no longer satisfied with corrupt and broken politics and an
economy of stark inequality and injustice.'
by
Deirdre Fulton, staff writer
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Bernie Sanders, who traveled to Italy with his wife Jane and 10 family
members, was mobbed by media following his searing speech at the Pontifical
Academy of Social Sciences on Friday. (Photo: Reuters)
At the Vatican on Friday, Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders
railed against everything from environmental destruction and the weakening
of the rights of workers to widespread financial criminality on Wall Street
and unregulated globalization.
"Rather than an economy aimed at the common good, we have been left with an
economy operated for the top 1 percent, who get richer and richer as the
working class, the young and the poor fall further and further behind," the
senator from Vermont declared in a speech that the Guardian described as
"one of the most powerful indictments of modern capitalism of his campaign."
In advance of the visit, the Associated Press noted that the trip "reflects
[Sanders'] admiration for Pope Francis" and indeed, the AP reported later
that Sanders "cited Pope Francis and St. John Paul II repeatedly during his
speech."
Sanders said:
Some might feel that it is hopeless to fight the economic juggernaut, that
once the market economy escaped the boundaries of morality it would be
impossible to bring the economy back under the dictates of morality and the
common good. I am told time and time again by the rich and powerful, and the
mainstream media that represent them, that we should be "practical," that we
should accept the status quo; that a truly moral economy is beyond our
reach. Yet Pope Francis himself is surely the world's greatest demonstration
against such a surrender to despair and cynicism. He has opened the eyes of
the world once again to the claims of mercy, justice and the possibilities
of a better world. He is inspiring the world to find a new global consensus
for our common home.
Sanders delivered his remarks at the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences,
at an academic conference which also hosted Bolivian president Evo Morales
and Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa. The conference marked the 25th
anniversary conference on Centesimus Annus, an important encyclical released
by Pope John Paul II that expounded on the economy and social issues after
the Cold War.
The chancellor for the pontifical academy, Bishop Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo,
has said he invited Sanders, who is Jewish, because he was the only U.S.
presidential candidate who showed deep interest in the teachings of Francis.
The international visit comes just days before the April 19 New York
primary.
"While he could have packed his schedule with different stops throughout the
boroughs of New York City or the upper reaches of the state, the
international trip may actually have greater impact," ABC News reported,
quoting ABC political analyst Matt Dowd as saying, "I think it's a really
smart move."
What's more, ABC added:
It also helps that Sanders' rival, Hillary Clinton, is headed out of the
state for part of the weekend, as well. She is flying to California for
fundraisers later today, including a closed-door event hosted by actor
George Clooney and his wife, Amal.
USA Today reported that "[t]he small American community in Rome was
enthusiastic about the visit." In March, Sanders won the Global Presidential
Primary, taking 69 percent of Democrats Abroad, the official overseas arm of
the Democratic Party.
Furthermore, USA Today reported:
Sanders is popular in Italy, where - as in most of Europe - his economic and
social views are mainstream. He was greeted by applause from a mostly
Italian crowd when he left the Vatican, and the visit attracted wide
attention from Italian media. Sanders stopped several times to shake hands,
and he smiled broadly and waved when a woman in a crowd shouted, "We love
you, Bernie!"
Sanders spoke to reporters after his speech, saying he has been "enormously
impressed" by Pope Francis and decrying the "greed of the fossil fuel
industry" among other things:
Read Sanders' prepared remarks in full below:
I am honored to be with you today and was pleased to receive your invitation
to speak to this conference of The Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences.
Today we celebrate the encyclical Centesimus Annus and reflect on its
meaning for our world a quarter-century after it was presented by Pope John
Paul II. With the fall of Communism, Pope John Paul II gave a clarion call
for human freedom in its truest sense: freedom that defends the dignity of
every person and that is always oriented towards the common good.
The Church's social teachings, stretching back to the first modern
encyclical about the industrial economy, Rerum Novarum in 1891, to
Centesimus Annus, to Pope Francis's inspiring encyclical Laudato Si' this
past year, have grappled with the challenges of the market economy. There
are few places in modern thought that rival the depth and insight of the
Church's moral teachings on the market economy.
Over a century ago, Pope Leo XIII highlighted economic issues and challenges
in Rerum Novarum that continue to haunt us today, such as what he called
"the enormous wealth of a few as opposed to the poverty of the many."
And let us be clear. That situation is worse today. In the year 2016, the
top one percent of the people on this planet own more wealth than the bottom
99 percent, while the wealthiest 60 people - 60 people - own more than the
bottom half - 3 1/2 billion people. At a time when so few have so much, and
so many have so little, we must reject the foundations of this contemporary
economy as immoral and unsustainable.
The words of Centesimus Annus likewise resonate with us today. One striking
example:
Furthermore, society and the State must ensure wage levels adequate for the
maintenance of the worker and his family, including a certain amount for
savings. This requires a continuous effort to improve workers' training and
capability so that their work will be more skilled and productive, as well
as careful controls and adequate legislative measures to block shameful
forms of exploitation, especially to the disadvantage of the most vulnerable
workers, of immigrants and of those on the margins of society. The role of
trade unions in negotiating minimum salaries and working conditions is
decisive in this area. (Para15)
The essential wisdom of Centesimus Annus is this: A market economy is
beneficial for productivity and economic freedom. But if we let the quest
for profits dominate society; if workers become disposable cogs of the
financial system; if vast inequalities of power and wealth lead to
marginalization of the poor and the powerless; then the common good is
squandered and the market economy fails us. Pope John Paul II puts it this
way: profit that is the result of "illicit exploitation, speculation, or the
breaking of solidarity among working people . . . has not justification, and
represents an abuse in the sight of God and man." (Para43).
We are now twenty-five years after the fall of Communist rule in Eastern
Europe. Yet we have to acknowledge that Pope John Paul's warnings about the
excesses of untrammeled finance were deeply prescient. Twenty-five years
after Centesimus Annus, speculation, illicit financial flows, environmental
destruction, and the weakening of the rights of workers is far more severe
than it was a quarter century ago. Financial excesses, indeed widespread
financial criminality on Wall Street, played a direct role in causing the
world's worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
We need a political analysis as well as a moral and anthropological analysis
to understand what has happened since 1991. We can say that with unregulated
globalization, a world market economy built on speculative finance burst
through the legal, political, and moral constraints that had once served to
protect the common good. In my country, home of the world's largest
financial markets, globalization was used as a pretext to deregulate the
banks, ending decades of legal protections for working people and small
businesses. Politicians joined hands with the leading bankers to allow the
banks to become "too big to fail." The result: eight years ago the American
economy and much of the world was plunged into the worst economic decline
since the 1930s. Working people lost their jobs, their homes and their
savings, while the government bailed out the banks.
Inexplicably, the United States political system doubled down on this
reckless financial deregulation, when the U.S. Supreme Court in a series of
deeply misguided decisions, unleashed an unprecedented flow of money into
American politics. These decisions culminated in the infamous Citizen United
case, which opened the financial spigots for huge campaign donations by
billionaires and large corporations to turn the U.S. political system to
their narrow and greedy advantage. It has established a system in which
billionaires can buy elections. Rather than an economy aimed at the common
good, we have been left with an economy operated for the top 1 percent, who
get richer and richer as the working class, the young and the poor fall
further and further behind. And the billionaires and banks have reaped the
returns of their campaign investments, in the form of special tax
privileges, imbalanced trade agreements that favor investors over workers,
and that even give multinational companies extra-judicial power over
governments that are trying to regulate them.
But as both Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis have warned us and the world,
the consequences have been even direr than the disastrous effects of
financial bubbles and falling living standards of working-class families.
Our very soul as a nation has suffered as the public lost faith in political
and social institutions. As Pope Francis has stated: "Man is not in charge
today, money is in charge, money rules." And the Pope has also stated: "We
have created new idols. The worship of the golden calf of old has found a
new and heartless image in the cult of money and the dictatorship of an
economy which is faceless and lacking any truly humane goal."
And further: "While the income of a minority is increasing exponentially,
that of the majority is crumbling. This imbalance results from ideologies
which uphold the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation, and
thus deny the right of control to States, which are themselves charged with
providing for the common good."
Pope Francis has called on the world to say: "No to a financial system that
rules rather than serves" in Evangeli Gaudium. And he called upon financial
executives and political leaders to pursue financial reform that is informed
by ethical considerations. He stated plainly and powerfully that the role of
wealth and resources in a moral economy must be that of servant, not master.
The widening gaps between the rich and poor, the desperation of the
marginalized, the power of corporations over politics, is not a phenomenon
of the United States alone. The excesses of the unregulated global economy
have caused even more damage in the developing countries. They suffer not
only from the boom-bust cycles on Wall Street, but from a world economy that
puts profits over pollution, oil companies over climate safety, and arms
trade over peace. And as an increasing share of new wealth and income goes
to a small fraction of those at the top, fixing this gross inequality has
become a central challenge. The issue of wealth and income inequality is the
great economic issue of our time, the great political issue of our time, and
the great moral issue of our time. It is an issue that we must confront in
my nation and across the world.
Pope Francis has given the most powerful name to the predicament of modern
society: the Globalization of Indifference. "Almost without being aware of
it," he noted, "we end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the
outcry of the poor, weeping for other people's pain, and feeling a need to
help them, as though all this were someone else's responsibility and not our
own." We have seen on Wall Street that financial fraud became not only the
norm but in many ways the new business model. Top bankers have shown no
shame for their bad behavior and have made no apologies to the public. The
billions and billions of dollars of fines they have paid for financial fraud
are just another cost of doing business, another short cut to unjust
profits.
Some might feel that it is hopeless to fight the economic juggernaut, that
once the market economy escaped the boundaries of morality it would be
impossible to bring the economy back under the dictates of morality and the
common good. I am told time and time again by the rich and powerful, and the
mainstream media that represent them, that we should be "practical," that we
should accept the status quo; that a truly moral economy is beyond our
reach. Yet Pope Francis himself is surely the world's greatest demonstration
against such a surrender to despair and cynicism. He has opened the eyes of
the world once again to the claims of mercy, justice and the possibilities
of a better world. He is inspiring the world to find a new global consensus
for our common home.
I see that hope and sense of possibility every day among America's young
people. Our youth are no longer satisfied with corrupt and broken politics
and an economy of stark inequality and injustice. They are not satisfied
with the destruction of our environment by a fossil fuel industry whose
greed has put short term profits ahead of climate change and the future of
our planet. They want to live in harmony with nature, not destroy it. They
are calling out for a return to fairness; for an economy that defends the
common good by ensuring that every person, rich or poor, has access to
quality health care, nutrition and education.
As Pope Francis made powerfully clear last year in Laudato Si', we have the
technology and know-how to solve our problems - from poverty to climate
change to health care to protection of biodiversity. We also have the vast
wealth to do so, especially if the rich pay their way in fair taxes rather
than hiding their funds in the world's tax and secrecy havens- as the Panama
Papers have shown.
The challenges facing our planet are not mainly technological or even
financial, because as a world we are rich enough to increase our investments
in skills, infrastructure, and technological know-how to meet our needs and
to protect the planet. Our challenge is mostly a moral one, to redirect our
efforts and vision to the common good. Centesimus Annus, which we celebrate
and reflect on today, and Laudato Si', are powerful, eloquent and hopeful
messages of this possibility. It is up to us to learn from them, and to move
boldly toward the common good in our time.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
License
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'Towards the Common Good': Mr. Sanders Goes to the Vatican
Published on
Friday, April 15, 2016
by
Common Dreams
'Towards the Common Good': Mr. Sanders Goes to the Vatican
'Our youth are no longer satisfied with corrupt and broken politics and an
economy of stark inequality and injustice.'
by
Deirdre Fulton, staff writer
. 13 Comments
.
. Bernie Sanders, who traveled to Italy with his wife Jane and 10
family members, was mobbed by media following his searing speech at the
Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences on Friday. (Photo: Reuters)
. At the Vatican on Friday, Democratic presidential candidate Bernie
Sanders railed against everything from environmental destruction and the
weakening of the rights of workers to widespread financial criminality on
Wall Street and unregulated globalization.
. "Rather than an economy aimed at the common good, we have been left
with an economy operated for the top 1 percent, who get richer and richer as
the working class, the young and the poor fall further and further behind,"
the senator from Vermont declared in a speech that the Guardian described as
"one of the most powerful indictments of modern capitalism of his campaign."
. In advance of the visit, the Associated Press noted that the trip
"reflects [Sanders'] admiration for Pope Francis" and indeed, the AP
reported later that Sanders "cited Pope Francis and St. John Paul II
repeatedly during his speech."
. Sanders said:
Some might feel that it is hopeless to fight the economic juggernaut, that
once the market economy escaped the boundaries of morality it would be
impossible to bring the economy back under the dictates of morality and the
common good. I am told time and time again by the rich and powerful, and the
mainstream media that represent them, that we should be "practical," that we
should accept the status quo; that a truly moral economy is beyond our
reach. Yet Pope Francis himself is surely the world's greatest demonstration
against such a surrender to despair and cynicism. He has opened the eyes of
the world once again to the claims of mercy, justice and the possibilities
of a better world. He is inspiring the world to find a new global consensus
for our common home.
Sanders delivered his remarks at the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences,
at an academic conference which also hosted Bolivian president Evo Morales
and Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa. The conference marked the 25th
anniversary conference on Centesimus Annus, an important encyclical released
by Pope John Paul II that expounded on the economy and social issues after
the Cold War.
The chancellor for the pontifical academy, Bishop Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo,
has said he invited Sanders, who is Jewish, because he was the only U.S.
presidential candidate who showed deep interest in the teachings of Francis.
https://salsa.wiredforchange.com/o/1493/donate_page/spring2016-articlehttps:
//salsa.wiredforchange.com/o/1493/donate_page/spring2016-article
The international visit comes just days before the April 19 New York
primary.
"While he could have packed his schedule with different stops throughout the
boroughs of New York City or the upper reaches of the state, the
international trip may actually have greater impact," ABC News reported,
quoting ABC political analyst Matt Dowd as saying, "I think it's a really
smart move."
What's more, ABC added:
It also helps that Sanders' rival, Hillary Clinton, is headed out of the
state for part of the weekend, as well. She is flying to California for
fundraisers later today, including a closed-door event hosted by actor
George Clooney and his wife, Amal.
USA Today reported that "[t]he small American community in Rome was
enthusiastic about the visit." In March, Sanders won the Global Presidential
Primary, taking 69 percent of Democrats Abroad, the official overseas arm of
the Democratic Party.
Furthermore, USA Today reported:
Sanders is popular in Italy, where - as in most of Europe - his economic and
social views are mainstream. He was greeted by applause from a mostly
Italian crowd when he left the Vatican, and the visit attracted wide
attention from Italian media. Sanders stopped several times to shake hands,
and he smiled broadly and waved when a woman in a crowd shouted, "We love
you, Bernie!"
Sanders spoke to reporters after his speech, saying he has been "enormously
impressed" by Pope Francis and decrying the "greed of the fossil fuel
industry" among other things:
Read Sanders' prepared remarks in full below:
I am honored to be with you today and was pleased to receive your invitation
to speak to this conference of The Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences.
Today we celebrate the encyclical Centesimus Annus and reflect on its
meaning for our world a quarter-century after it was presented by Pope John
Paul II. With the fall of Communism, Pope John Paul II gave a clarion call
for human freedom in its truest sense: freedom that defends the dignity of
every person and that is always oriented towards the common good.
The Church's social teachings, stretching back to the first modern
encyclical about the industrial economy, Rerum Novarum in 1891, to
Centesimus Annus, to Pope Francis's inspiring encyclical Laudato Si' this
past year, have grappled with the challenges of the market economy. There
are few places in modern thought that rival the depth and insight of the
Church's moral teachings on the market economy.
Over a century ago, Pope Leo XIII highlighted economic issues and challenges
in Rerum Novarum that continue to haunt us today, such as what he called
"the enormous wealth of a few as opposed to the poverty of the many."
And let us be clear. That situation is worse today. In the year 2016, the
top one percent of the people on this planet own more wealth than the bottom
99 percent, while the wealthiest 60 people - 60 people - own more than the
bottom half - 3 1/2 billion people. At a time when so few have so much, and
so many have so little, we must reject the foundations of this contemporary
economy as immoral and unsustainable.
The words of Centesimus Annus likewise resonate with us today. One striking
example:
Furthermore, society and the State must ensure wage levels adequate for the
maintenance of the worker and his family, including a certain amount for
savings. This requires a continuous effort to improve workers' training and
capability so that their work will be more skilled and productive, as well
as careful controls and adequate legislative measures to block shameful
forms of exploitation, especially to the disadvantage of the most vulnerable
workers, of immigrants and of those on the margins of society. The role of
trade unions in negotiating minimum salaries and working conditions is
decisive in this area. (Para15)
The essential wisdom of Centesimus Annus is this: A market economy is
beneficial for productivity and economic freedom. But if we let the quest
for profits dominate society; if workers become disposable cogs of the
financial system; if vast inequalities of power and wealth lead to
marginalization of the poor and the powerless; then the common good is
squandered and the market economy fails us. Pope John Paul II puts it this
way: profit that is the result of "illicit exploitation, speculation, or the
breaking of solidarity among working people . . . has not justification, and
represents an abuse in the sight of God and man." (Para43).
We are now twenty-five years after the fall of Communist rule in Eastern
Europe. Yet we have to acknowledge that Pope John Paul's warnings about the
excesses of untrammeled finance were deeply prescient. Twenty-five years
after Centesimus Annus, speculation, illicit financial flows, environmental
destruction, and the weakening of the rights of workers is far more severe
than it was a quarter century ago. Financial excesses, indeed widespread
financial criminality on Wall Street, played a direct role in causing the
world's worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
We need a political analysis as well as a moral and anthropological analysis
to understand what has happened since 1991. We can say that with unregulated
globalization, a world market economy built on speculative finance burst
through the legal, political, and moral constraints that had once served to
protect the common good. In my country, home of the world's largest
financial markets, globalization was used as a pretext to deregulate the
banks, ending decades of legal protections for working people and small
businesses. Politicians joined hands with the leading bankers to allow the
banks to become "too big to fail." The result: eight years ago the American
economy and much of the world was plunged into the worst economic decline
since the 1930s. Working people lost their jobs, their homes and their
savings, while the government bailed out the banks.
Inexplicably, the United States political system doubled down on this
reckless financial deregulation, when the U.S. Supreme Court in a series of
deeply misguided decisions, unleashed an unprecedented flow of money into
American politics. These decisions culminated in the infamous Citizen United
case, which opened the financial spigots for huge campaign donations by
billionaires and large corporations to turn the U.S. political system to
their narrow and greedy advantage. It has established a system in which
billionaires can buy elections. Rather than an economy aimed at the common
good, we have been left with an economy operated for the top 1 percent, who
get richer and richer as the working class, the young and the poor fall
further and further behind. And the billionaires and banks have reaped the
returns of their campaign investments, in the form of special tax
privileges, imbalanced trade agreements that favor investors over workers,
and that even give multinational companies extra-judicial power over
governments that are trying to regulate them.
But as both Pope John Paul II and Pope Francis have warned us and the world,
the consequences have been even direr than the disastrous effects of
financial bubbles and falling living standards of working-class families.
Our very soul as a nation has suffered as the public lost faith in political
and social institutions. As Pope Francis has stated: "Man is not in charge
today, money is in charge, money rules." And the Pope has also stated: "We
have created new idols. The worship of the golden calf of old has found a
new and heartless image in the cult of money and the dictatorship of an
economy which is faceless and lacking any truly humane goal."
And further: "While the income of a minority is increasing exponentially,
that of the majority is crumbling. This imbalance results from ideologies
which uphold the absolute autonomy of markets and financial speculation, and
thus deny the right of control to States, which are themselves charged with
providing for the common good."
Pope Francis has called on the world to say: "No to a financial system that
rules rather than serves" in Evangeli Gaudium. And he called upon financial
executives and political leaders to pursue financial reform that is informed
by ethical considerations. He stated plainly and powerfully that the role of
wealth and resources in a moral economy must be that of servant, not master.
The widening gaps between the rich and poor, the desperation of the
marginalized, the power of corporations over politics, is not a phenomenon
of the United States alone. The excesses of the unregulated global economy
have caused even more damage in the developing countries. They suffer not
only from the boom-bust cycles on Wall Street, but from a world economy that
puts profits over pollution, oil companies over climate safety, and arms
trade over peace. And as an increasing share of new wealth and income goes
to a small fraction of those at the top, fixing this gross inequality has
become a central challenge. The issue of wealth and income inequality is the
great economic issue of our time, the great political issue of our time, and
the great moral issue of our time. It is an issue that we must confront in
my nation and across the world.
Pope Francis has given the most powerful name to the predicament of modern
society: the Globalization of Indifference. "Almost without being aware of
it," he noted, "we end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the
outcry of the poor, weeping for other people's pain, and feeling a need to
help them, as though all this were someone else's responsibility and not our
own." We have seen on Wall Street that financial fraud became not only the
norm but in many ways the new business model. Top bankers have shown no
shame for their bad behavior and have made no apologies to the public. The
billions and billions of dollars of fines they have paid for financial fraud
are just another cost of doing business, another short cut to unjust
profits.
Some might feel that it is hopeless to fight the economic juggernaut, that
once the market economy escaped the boundaries of morality it would be
impossible to bring the economy back under the dictates of morality and the
common good. I am told time and time again by the rich and powerful, and the
mainstream media that represent them, that we should be "practical," that we
should accept the status quo; that a truly moral economy is beyond our
reach. Yet Pope Francis himself is surely the world's greatest demonstration
against such a surrender to despair and cynicism. He has opened the eyes of
the world once again to the claims of mercy, justice and the possibilities
of a better world. He is inspiring the world to find a new global consensus
for our common home.
I see that hope and sense of possibility every day among America's young
people. Our youth are no longer satisfied with corrupt and broken politics
and an economy of stark inequality and injustice. They are not satisfied
with the destruction of our environment by a fossil fuel industry whose
greed has put short term profits ahead of climate change and the future of
our planet. They want to live in harmony with nature, not destroy it. They
are calling out for a return to fairness; for an economy that defends the
common good by ensuring that every person, rich or poor, has access to
quality health care, nutrition and education.
As Pope Francis made powerfully clear last year in Laudato Si', we have the
technology and know-how to solve our problems - from poverty to climate
change to health care to protection of biodiversity. We also have the vast
wealth to do so, especially if the rich pay their way in fair taxes rather
than hiding their funds in the world's tax and secrecy havens- as the Panama
Papers have shown.
The challenges facing our planet are not mainly technological or even
financial, because as a world we are rich enough to increase our investments
in skills, infrastructure, and technological know-how to meet our needs and
to protect the planet. Our challenge is mostly a moral one, to redirect our
efforts and vision to the common good. Centesimus Annus, which we celebrate
and reflect on today, and Laudato Si', are powerful, eloquent and hopeful
messages of this possibility. It is up to us to learn from them, and to move
boldly toward the common good in our time.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0
License
