Paul Half-dozen, 50 years ago: 'No more than state of war, state of war never again'

Paul 6 speaking before United Nations (Photo past Catholic News Service)

On this day 50 years ago Pope Paul Six became the first pope to visit and address the Un.

It was on Oct. 4, 1965, the pontiff said: "No more war, war never over again."

He called for everyone to become peacemakers. He called for our church to rediscover his nonviolent roots.

Peacemaking was not incidental to Paul Six'south talk that day; it was at its centre. The following is taken from that historic address.

And at present Nosotros come up to the high betoken of Our message: Negatively, first: the words which y'all await from Us and which We cannot pronounce without full awareness of their gravity and solemnity: Never one confronting the other, never, never again. Was it non principally for this purpose that the United Nations came into beingness: confronting state of war and for peace? Listen to the clear words of a great human, the late John Kennedy, who declared iv years ago: "Mankind must put an end to war, or state of war will put an terminate to mankind." Long discourses are non necessary to proclaim the supreme goal of your institution. It is enough to remember that the blood of millions of men, numberless and unprecedented sufferings, useless slaughter and frightful ruin are the sanction of the covenant which unites you, in a solemn pledge which must change the future history of the globe: No more state of war, war never once more. Information technology is peace, peace which must guide the destinies of peoples and of all mankind. Our thank you to y'all, celebrity to you, who for twenty years have labored for peace and who have fifty-fifty suffered the loss of illustrious men in this sacred crusade. Thanks and glory to you lot for the conflicts, which you have prevented, and for those, which you have brought to an end. The results of your efforts on behalf of peace, including the most recent, even if they are not still decisive, are such as to deserve that We, presuming to interpret the sentiments of the whole world, express to you both praise and gratitude.

Gentlemen, you have performed and you continue to perform a great work: the instruction of mankind in the ways of peace. The United Nations is the groovy school where that education is imparted, and We are today in the Associates Hall of that school. Everyone taking his identify here becomes a educatee and also a teacher in the art of building peace. When you leave this hall, the world looks upon y'all as the architects and the builders of peace. Peace, as yous know, is not built solely by means of politics and the balance of forces and of interests. Information technology is constructed with the mind, with ideas, with works of peace. You labor in this great construction. But you are still at the outset of your labors. Will the world e'er succeed in irresolute that selfish and bellicose mentality which, upwards to now, has woven and so much of its history: It is hard to foresee, but it is easy to assert that it is toward that new history, a peaceful, a truly and fully human history, as promised by God to men of goodwill, that we must resolutely set out. The roads prevarication well marked before you; the beginning ane is that of disarmament.

If you wish to be brothers, allow the weapons fall from your hands. 1 cannot honey with offensive weapons in his easily. Those weapons, especially the terrible weapons that modern science has given y'all, long before they produce victims and ruins, cause bad dreams, foster bad feelings, create nightmares, distrust and somber resolves; they demand enormous expenditures; they obstruct projects of solidarity and useful piece of work; they falsify the very psychology of peoples. As long as man remains that weak, child-bearing and even wicked beingness that he oftentimes shows himself to be, defensive arms will, unfortunately, be necessary. Every bit for you, however, your courage and your work impel you to written report means of guaranteeing the security of international life without recourse to artillery. This is an aim worthy of your efforts; this is what the peoples of the world expect of you; this is what yous must achieve. And for this, unanimous conviction in this establishment must increase, its authorization must increment; and this goal, one may hope, will be attained. You will win the gratitude of all peoples, relieved as they will and so exist from the crushing expense of armaments and freed from the nightmare of an ever-imminent state of war. We know and how could We fail to rejoice that many of you accept looked with favor upon the invitation that, in the crusade of peace, Nosotros addressed from Bombay last Dec to all States: to devote to the do good of the developing countries at least a part of the savings which could exist realized through the reduction of armaments. Nosotros here renew that invitation, trusting in your sentiments of humanity and generosity. In speaking of humanity and generosity,

Nosotros are echoing another fundamental principle of the United Nations, which is its very summit, namely, that you piece of work hither non but to avoid conflicts between States, but also to make States capable of working for each other. Y'all are not content with facilitating mere coexistence between nations; you take a much greater footstep forward, one deserving of Our praise and Our support: you organize brotherly cooperation among peoples. In this mode a system of solidarity is established, so that lofty civilized aims may win the orderly and unanimous support of all the family of peoples for the common skilful and for the good of each private. This is the finest aspect of the United Nations; it is its virtually truly human being aspect; it is the ideal that mankind dreams of on its pilgrimage through fourth dimension; it is the world's greatest hope; information technology is, Nosotros presume to say, the reflection of the loving and transcendent design of God for the progress of the human family on globe a reflection in which We see the heavenly bulletin of the Gospel. Here indeed Nosotros seem to hear the echo of the vocalism of Our Predecessors, and particularly of Pope John XXIII, whose message of " Pacem in Terris " received so honorable and significant a response amid y'all. You lot proclaim here the fundamental rights and duties of man, his dignity, his freedom and above all his religious freedom. Nosotros feel that you thus interpret the highest sphere of human wisdom and, We would nigh say, its sacred character. For y'all bargain here above all with man life, and homo life is sacred; no one may dare make an attempt upon it. Respect for life, even with regard to the great problem of the birth rate, must find here in your Assembly its highest affidavit and its nigh rational defence. Your task is to ensure that there is enough breadstuff on the tables of mankind, and not to encourage an bogus command of births, which would be irrational, in society to diminish the number of guests at the feast of life. Information technology is not enough, however, to feed the hungry; it is necessary too to assure to each man a life that befits his dignity. This, also, you strive to achieve. Is this not the fulfillment before Our very eyes, and through your efforts, of that prophetic utterances applicable to your Establishment: "They shall beat out their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks" (Is. two:4).

Are you not using the prodigious energies of the earth and the magnificent inventions of science, no longer as instruments of death, simply as tools of life for the new era of humanity? We know with what increasing intensity and effectiveness the United Nations and its related world agencies are working to assist governments, which need help to hasten their economical and social progress. We know how ardently you labor to overcome illiteracy and to promote civilisation throughout the globe; to give men acceptable and mod medical assistance; to employ in human being'due south service the marvelous resources of scientific discipline, technology and system. All this is magnificent and merits everyone'south praise and support, including Our own. We, too, would set an example, even though the smallness of Our means may hinder an awareness of its applied implication: We intend to give Our charitable institutions a new development in order to combat the hunger of the world and to meet its principle needs. It is thus, and in no other way, that peace can be built. One more word, Gentlemen, ane final word: this edifice which you are amalgam does not remainder upon merely material and earthly foundations, for if and then, it would be a house built upon sand; it rests above all on our own consciences. The hour has indeed struck for "conversion," for personal transformation, for interior renewal. We must get used to thinking of human being in a new way; and of men's life in mutual in a new mode; in a new way, too, of the paths of history and the destiny of the earth, in accordance with the words of Saint Paul, to "put on the new man, which has been created according to God in justice and holiness of truth" (Eph. 4:23).

Bring together the Conversation

Send your thoughts and reactions to Letters to the Editor. Acquire more here