(Vatican Radio) Cardinal Peter Turkson has called for action in countries that are seriously affected by the HIV pandemic regarding the progress that has been made to stop the transmission of the HIV virus to children.
The words of the President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace came in a message addressed to Caritas Internationalis and its global partners, many of whom are faith-based organizations, who are committed to improving diagnosis and care for children who are living with HIV.
The message follows a Vatican meeting on Pediatric Treatment that took place in the Vatican in mid May.
Listen to the report by Linda Bordoni :
On a positive note, Cardinal Turkson said that based on “the discussions at the meeting that focused on early diagnosis and treatment of children, we expect real progress”.
He commended participants at the meeting for their desire to collaborate on improving access to life-saving medicines for children threatened by the HIV virus, and said that now is the moment to add practical and effective measures to earlier commitments
“I hope especially for a focus on the seriously affected countries where little progress has been made to stop the transmission of the virus to children, and where national efforts have not sufficiently addressed the obstacles to accessing treatment in local communities. This reflects the sad reality that health care is not a right for all” he said.
Please find below the full text of the communiqué:
Follow up Vatican meeting on Pediatric Treatment
Casina Pio IV, 16-17 May 2016
From 11-15 April 2016, Caritas Internationalis brought together global partners to discuss the role of faith-based organizations and the private sector in closing the global HIV testing and treatment gap for children living with HIV. Two events were held in the Vatican City and co-organized with UNAIDS, PEPFAR, and the Vatican’s Bambino Gesù Paediatric Hospital.
Pope Francis called on meeting participants to find “ new possibilities of providing greater access to life-saving diagnosis and treatment” for children….. Let it (the dialogue) continue until we find the will, the technical expertise, the resources and the methods that provide access to diagnosis and treatment available to all, and not simply to a privileged few for…there is no human life that is qualitatively more significant than another. ”[1]
Cardinal Peter Turkson, President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, hosted and opened a high-level meeting with representatives from the private sector, including pharmaceutical and diagnostics companies; faith-based organizations responding to HIV; groups of people living with HIV; national governments; the United Nations and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. In his opening remarks, the Cardinal drew from Pope Francis’ Laudato si’. In this Encyclical, the Pope challenges the world to take renewed and coordinated action against the factors, such as climate change, pandemics, poverty, conflict and violence that result in the deterioration of the natural and social environment.
Participants at the earlier meeting debated and agreed upon the most urgent actions needed to strengthen equitable access to testing and treatment for children living with HIV. Delegates in the second meeting committed themselves to find collective solutions, such as multi-partner agreements to encourage more research on HIV treatment for children; accelerating the process of testing, approving and registering new HIV medicines for children; innovative solutions to present drugs and supplies stock-outs; and health system strengthening.
Please find below the full text of Cardinal Peter Turkson’s message:
Second Meeting of
Directors of Pharmaceutical and Diagnostic Industries
for children living with HIV:
Consultation on “Fast-Tracking Paediatric HIV Diagnosis and Treatment” (to improve access to early diagnosis and effective treatment)
Your Eminence John Cardinal Onaiyekan, Archbishop of Abuja, Nigeria,
Dr. P.D. Parirenyatwa, Minister of Health of Zimbabwe.
Dr. Luiz Loures, Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations and Deputy Executive Director of UNAIDS,
Dr Bernard Bossiky, Deputy Executive Secretary of the National AIDS Council, Democratic Republic of Congo,
Ms. Sandra Thurman, Chief Strategist, Office of the Global AIDS Coordinator, United States of America,
Dr. Gottfried Hirnschall, Director of the HIV/AIDS Programme of the World Health Organization,
Rev. Canon Flora Winfield, Representative of the Anglican Communion to the United Nations,
Representatives from the private sector, including pharmaceutical and diagnostics companies, people living with HIV,
Staff of World Health Organization and UNAIDS,
Representatives of religious and non-governmental organizations responding to HIV
It is my pleasure to welcome all of you in the name of the Holy Father. Pope Francis appreciates your important undertaking and extends his prayerful best wishes. On behalf of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, too, I welcome you to Casina Pio IV, the historic home of the Pontifical Academies.
The goal of this gathering is to follow-up on a previous meeting last 15 April, 2016, and to formulate concrete responses to the drama of poor access to medication and diagnostics of such common, but prevalent diseases as child-HIV infection, Tuberculosis and Hepatitis. The pursuit of this goal, at this meeting, is well served by the active involvement of national governments, U.N. bodies, religious groups and leaders, the private sector, including pharmaceutical and diagnostics companies, and people living with HIV.
So, when the question is put simply as: Why are we gathered here today? The answer can also be simply put as: our goal is to improve access to HIV treatment for children, motivated particularly in this Jubilee year of Mercy to consider the plight of children not only with the intelligence of the market place, but also with the intelligence of the heart!
Jesus is reported by two of the evangelists to have said “Suffer the little children to come unto me” (Mt 19:14, Lk 18:16) – he did not say ‘let the children suffer’. In order to reduce the suffering of children due to AIDS, I believe this meeting should focus on three objectives or responses to three questions:
Why are we gathered here today? The answer can also be simply put as: our goal is to improve access to HIV treatment for children, motivated particularly in this Jubilee year of Mercy to consider the plight of children not only with the intelligence of the market place, but also with the intelligence of the heart!
Jesus is reported by two of the evangelists to have said “Suffer the little children to come unto me” (Mt 19:14, Lk 18:16) – he did not say ‘let the children suffer’. In order to reduce the suffering of children due to AIDS, I believe this meeting should focus on three objectives or responses to three questions:
1) WHY : We should firmly state the foundations for this work – the underlying values, ethical imperatives and indeed spirituality that are the point of departure for faith-based organizations engaged in providing diagnosis and treatment for children living with HIV and in supporting their families and other caregivers.
2) WHAT : Our task is to create an ambitious fast-track road-map or strategy to scale up effective treatment for children living with HIV. This plan of action will be launched at the high-level meeting on ending AIDS, 8-10 June in New York. It will include a model project for broad collaboration in selected high-burden countries.
3) WHO : We must begin to form the coalition of partners, mirroring the inclusive representation of today’s meeting and seriously committed to following the map and implementing the strategy.
This meeting, as observed above, builds on your discussions last month on early diagnosis and treatment of children, so we expect real progress. You already want to collaborate on improving access to life-saving medicines for children threatened by the HIV virus. Now it is the moment to add practical and effective measures to those earlier commitments.
I hope especially for a focus on the seriously affected countries where little progress has been made to stop the transmission of the virus to children, and where national efforts have not sufficiently addressed the obstacles to accessing treatment in local communities.
This reflects the sad reality that health care is not a right for all. The testimonies of religious Sisters, Priests, and Brothers, and lay volunteers with whom I speak, confirm that health care is still a privilege only for a few who can afford it, in different parts of the world and especially in many regions of Africa. Access to health care, treatment, and medicines still remains a ‘dream’ for too many. “Certain health issues, like the elimination of malaria and tuberculosis, treatment of so-called orphan diseases, and neglected sectors of tropical medicine, require urgent political attention, above and beyond all other commercial or political interests.” How clearly this draws us back to our foundations: as Pope Francis said to the previous meeting, “there is no human life that is qualitatively more significant than another.”
What is needed is sincere and open dialogue, with responsible cooperation on the part of all: political authorities, the scientific community, the business world and civil society. Positive examples are not lacking; they demonstrate that a genuine cooperation between politics, science and business can achieve significant results.
Your coming together in this Academy of reflection and dialogue signifies your dedication to the wellbeing and the future of children who face the threat of a serious illness but still have the hope and the will to live. May your efforts make it possible for some of those children to grow to contribute to the advancement of science and of the common good, as you are doing at the present time. May God bless you, inspire you, and strengthen your resolve in your pilgrimage for the good of the human family.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis focused on the Feast of Pentecost during his remarks before the Regina Coeli prayer on Sunday.
Listen to Christopher Wells’ report:
The day’s liturgy, Pope Francis said, “invites us to open our minds and our hearts to the gift of the Holy Spirit . . . the first and principle gift that He has obtained with His Resurrection and Ascension into Heaven.”
In the Gospel, Jesus says to His disciples, “If you love me, keep my commandments. And I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Paraclete to be with you always.” These words, the Pope said, “remind us above all that love for a person, and also for the Lord, is shown not with words but with facts.” The command to keep and observe the commandments must likewise be understood in such a way that they affect our whole life. In fact, the Pope said, “being Christians does not primarily mean pertaining to a certain culture or adhering to a certain doctrine, but rather, joining one’s very life, in every aspect, to the person of Jesus, and, through Him, to the Father.” It is precisely for this reason that Jesus promises to send the Holy Spirit: it is through the gift of the Spirit, “the love which unites the Father and the Son, and proceeds from them,” that we are able to live the very life of Jesus.
But “the Holy Spirit also exercises a function of teaching and memory.” Pope Francis explained that the Holy Spirit does not bring a teaching different from that of Jesus, but helps make Jesus’ teaching present and active in our lives.
The Holy Father concluded his remarks with the prayer that the Blessed Virgin Mary “might obtain for us the grace of being strongly animated by the Holy Spirit, that we might bear witness to Christ with evangelical frankness, and open ourselves more and more to the fullness of His love.”
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pentecost Sunday provided Pope Francis with the occasion to release his annual Message for World Mission Sunday, set to take place later this year, on the third Sunday of October.
In his Message, the Holy Father said the Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy invites us “to consider the missio ad gentes – the mission to the world – as a great, immense work of mercy, both spiritual and material.” World Mission Sunday, he continued, calls us “to ‘go out’ as missionary disciples, each generously offering their talents, creativity, wisdom and experience in order to bring the message of God’s tenderness and compassion to the entire human family.” He reminded us that “By virtue of the missionary mandate, the Church cares for those who do not know the Gospel, because she wants everyone to be saved and to experience the Lord’s love.”
Pope Francis emphasized the role of women in missionary work, noting the “considerable and growing presence of women in the missionary world” which he described as “a significant sign of God’s maternal love.”
He spoke, too, of the importance of education, adding, “I hope, therefore, that the holy people of God will continue to exercise this maternal service of mercy, which helps those who do not yet know the Lord to encounter and love Him.”
Pope Francis said, “All peoples and cultures have the right to receive the message of salvation which is God’s gift to every person.” Jesus’ command to preach the Gospel to all nations has not ceased, he concluded: “rather this command commits all of us, in the current landscape with all its challenges, to hear the call to a renewed missionary ‘impulse’.”
You can find the full text of Pope Francis’ Message for World Mission Sunday 2016 here .
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis preached on the passage “I will not leave you orphans” (Jn 14:18) during his homily at the Mass for Pentecost Sunday in St Peter’s.
Listen to Christoher Wells’ report:
Beginning with the first reading from St Paul’s Letter to the Romans, the Pope said, “Here we see our relationship renewed: the paternity of God is re-established in us thanks to the redemptive work of Christ and the gift of the Holy Spirit.” He continued, “The Spirit is given to us by the Father and leads us back to the Father. The entire work of salvation is one of ‘re-generation’, in which the fatherhood of God, through the gift of the Son and the Holy Spirit, frees us from the condition of being orphans into which we had fallen.”
Too often in this world we see “the signs of being orphans,” such as loneliness, the desire to be “free of God,” or the difficulty in seeing others as brothers and sisters.
But, the Pope said, “being children of God runs contrary to this, and is our primordial vocation – we were made to be God’s children, it is in our DNA.” This relationship, though, was ruined by sin, and it is only through death and resurrection of Jesus, God’s only-begotten Son, that that relationship can be reborn. It is precisely on account of Jesus’ death on the Cross that the Holy Spirit “has been poured out upon humanity like a vast torrent of grace.”
Jesus’ promise that He will not leave us orphans also reminds us of “the maternal presence” of Mary at Pentecost, the Pope said. “The Mother of Jesus is with the community of disciples gathered in prayer: she is the living remembrance of the Son and the living invocation of the Holy Spirit. She is the Mother of the Church.”
The Pope concluded his homily by saying that the gift of the Spirit allows us “to enter into a new experience of fraternity, allowing us to see one another “as brothers ansd sisters whose differences can only increase our joy and wonder at sharing in this unique fatherhood and brotherhood.”
You can find the full text of Pope Francis’ homily for Mass on Pentecost here .
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has released a Message for World Mission Sunday 2016, which takes place each year on the third Sunday of October.
Below please find the full text of Pope Francis’ Message
Missionary Church, Witness of Mercy
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
The Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy, which the Church is celebrating, casts a distinct light on World Mission Sunday 2016: it invites us to consider the missio ad gentes as a great, immense work of mercy, both spiritual and material. On this World Mission Sunday, all of us are invited to “go out” as missionary disciples, each generously offering their talents, creativity, wisdom and experience in order to bring the message of God’s tenderness and compassion to the entire human family. By virtue of the missionary mandate, the Church cares for those who do not know the Gospel, because she wants everyone to be saved and to experience the Lord’s love. She “is commissioned to announce the mercy of God, the beating heart of the Gospel” (Misericordiae Vultus, 12) and to proclaim mercy in every corner of the world, reaching every person, young or old.
When mercy encounters a person, it brings deep joy to the Father’s heart; for from the beginning the Father has lovingly turned towards the most vulnerable, because his greatness and power are revealed precisely in his capacity to identify with the young, the marginalized and the oppressed (cf. Deut 4:31; Ps 86:15; 103:8; 111:4). He is a kind, caring and faithful God who is close to those in need, especially the poor; he involves himself tenderly in human reality just as a father and mother do in the lives of their children (cf. Jer 31:20). When speaking of the womb, the Bible uses the word that signifies mercy: therefore it refers to the love of a mother for her children, whom she will always love, in every circumstance and regardless of what happens, because they are the fruit of her womb. This is also an essential aspect of the love that God has for all his children, whom he created and whom he wants to raise and educate; in the face of their weaknesses and infidelity, his heart is overcome with compassion (cf. Hos 11:8). He is merciful towards all; his love is for all people and his compassion extends to all creatures (cf. Ps 144:8-9).
Mercy finds its most noble and complete expression in the Incarnate Word. Jesus reveals the face of the Father who is rich in mercy; he “speaks of [mercy] and explains it by the use of comparisons and parables, but above all he himself makes it incarnate and personifies it” (JOHN PAUL II, Dives in Misericordia, 2). When we welcome and follow Jesus by means of the Gospel and sacraments, we can, with the help of the Holy Spirit, become merciful as our heavenly Father is merciful; we can learn to love as he loves us and make of our lives a free gift, a sign of his goodness (cf. Misericordiae Vultus, 3). The Church, in the midst of humanity, is first of all the community that lives by the mercy of Christ: she senses his gaze and feels he has chosen her with his merciful love. It is through this love that the Church discovers its mandate, lives it and makes it known to all peoples through a respectful dialogue with every culture and religious belief.
This merciful love, as in the early days of the Church, is witnessed to by many men and women of every age and condition. The considerable and growing presence of women in the missionary world, working alongside their male counterparts, is a significant sign of God’s maternal love. Women, lay and religious, and today even many families, carry out their missionary vocation in various forms: from announcing the Gospel to charitable service. Together with the evangelizing and sacramental work of missionaries, women and families often more adequately understand people’s problems and know how to deal with them in an appropriate and, at times, fresh way: in caring for life, with a strong focus on people rather than structures, and by allocating human and spiritual resources towards the building of good relations, harmony, peace, solidarity, dialogue, cooperation and fraternity, both among individuals and in social and cultural life, in particular through care for the poor.
In many places evangelization begins with education, to which missionary work dedicates much time and effort, like the merciful vine-dresser of the Gospel (cf. Lk 13:7-9; Jn 15:1), patiently waiting for fruit after years of slow cultivation; in this way they bring forth a new people able to evangelize, who will take the Gospel to those places where it otherwise would not have been thought possible. The Church can also be defined as “mother” for those who will one day have faith in Christ. I hope, therefore, that the holy people of God will continue to exercise this maternal service of mercy, which helps those who do not yet know the Lord to encounter and love him. Faith is God’s gift and not the result of proselytizing; rather it grows thanks to the faith and charity of evangelizers who witness to Christ. As they travel through the streets of the world, the disciples of Jesus need to have a love without limits, the same measure of love that our Lord has for all people. We proclaim the most beautiful and greatest gifts that he has given us: his life and his love.
All peoples and cultures have the right to receive the message of salvation which is God’s gift to every person. This is all the more necessary when we consider how many injustices, wars, and humanitarian crises still need resolution. Missionaries know from experience that the Gospel of forgiveness and mercy can bring joy and reconciliation, justice and peace. The mandate of the Gospel to “go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Mt 28:19-20) has not ceased; rather this command commits all of us, in the current landscape with all its challenges, to hear the call to a renewed missionary “impulse”, as I noted in my Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium: “Each Christian and every community must discern the path that the Lord points out, but all of us are asked to obey his call to go forth from our own comfort zone in order to reach all the ‘peripheries’ in need of the light of the Gospel” (20).
This Jubilee year marks the 90th anniversary of World Missionary Day, first approved by Pope Pius XI in 1926 and organized by the Pontifical Society for the Propagation of the Faith. It is appropriate then to recall the wise instructions of my Predecessors who ordered that to this Society be destined all the offerings collected in every diocese, parish, religious community, association and ecclesial movement throughout the world for the care of Christian communities in need and for supporting the proclamation of the Gospel even to the ends of the earth. Today too we believe in this sign of missionary ecclesial communion. Let us not close our hearts within our own particular concerns, but let us open them to all of humanity.
May Holy Mary, sublime icon of redeemed humanity, model of missionaries for the Church, teach all men, women and families, to foster and safeguard the living and mysterious presence of the Risen Lord in every place, he who renews personal relationships, cultures and peoples, and who fills all with joyful mercy.
From the Vatican, 15 May 2016, Solemnity of Pentecost
(from Vatican Radio)…