"A TRUE CULTURE OF FREEDOM"

By POPE JOHN PAUL II

For weeks he labored painstakingly to find just the right words: balancing regret for a fading century's horror with the promise borne by the approaching millennium. During his fourth trip to the U.S. last week, Pope John Paul II visited New York, New Jersey and Maryland, but the centerpiece was his speech to the United Nations General Assembly, on the eve of the U.N.'s 50th anniversary. Switching from English to French, from Russian to Spanish, the 75-year-old Pontiff condemned the genocidal impulses that have scarred the 20th century. But he held out hope for the 21st, saying that there is a "universal moral law written on the human heart." Later the same day, in a sermon delivered at a Mass attended by 83,000 people at Giants Stadium in New Jersey, he pursued his themes in remarks directed specifically at the U.S. Excerpts:

AT THE U.N.

ON THE THRESHOLD OF A NEW MILLENNIUM WE ARE WITNESSING an extraordinary global acceleration of that quest for freedom which is one of the great dynamics of human history. This phenomenon is not limited to any one part of the world; nor is it the expression of any single culture. Men and women throughout the world, even when threatened by violence, have taken the risk of freedom, asking to be given a place in social, political and economic life which is commensurate with their dignity as free human beings.

It is important for us to grasp what might be called the inner structure of this worldwide movement. It is precisely its global character which offers us its first and fundamental key and confirms that there are indeed universal human rights, rooted in the nature of the person, rights which reflect the objective and inviolable demands of a universal moral law. They also remind us that we do not live in an irrational and meaningless world. On the contrary, there is a moral logic which is built into human life and which makes possible dialogue between individuals and peoples. If we want a century of violent coercion to be succeeded by a century of persuasion, we must find a way to discuss the human future intelligibly. The universal moral law written on the human heart is precisely that kind of grammar which is needed if the world is to engage this discussion of the future ...

The quest for freedom in the second half of the 20th century has engaged not only individuals but nations as well ... The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted in 1948, spoke eloquently of the rights of persons; but no similar international agreement has yet adequately addressed the rights of nations. This situation must be carefully pondered, for it raises urgent questions about justice and freedom in the world today...

The rights of nations...are nothing but human rights fostered at the specific level of community life. A presupposition of a nation's rights is certainly its right to exist: therefore no one...is ever justified in asserting that an individual nation is not worthy of existence...

Unhappily, the world has yet to learn how to live with diversity, as recent events in the Balkans and Central Africa have painfully reminded us...Amplified by historic grievances and exacerbated by the manipulations of the unscrupulous, the fear of difference can lead to a denial of the very humanity of "the other," with the result that people fall into a cycle of violence in which no one is spared, not even the children ...

We need to clarify the essential difference between an unhealthy form of nationalism, which teaches contempt for other nations or cultures, and patriotism, which is a proper love of one's country...Nationalism, in its most radical forms, is thus the antithesis of true patriotism ...

Freedom is not simply the absence of tyranny or oppression. Nor is freedom a license to do whatever we like. Freedom has an inner logic which distinguishes it and ennobles it: freedom is ordered to the truth and is fulfilled in man's quest for truth and in man's living in the truth. Detached from the truth about the human person, freedom deteriorates into license in the lives of individuals, and in political life, it becomes the caprice of the most powerful and the arrogance of power. Far from being a limitation upon freedom or a threat to it, reference to the truth about the human person--a truth universally knowable through the moral law written on the hearts of all--is, in fact, the guarantor of freedom's future ...

It is one of the great paradoxes of our time that man, who began the period we call "modernity" with a self-confident assertion of his coming of age and autonomy, approaches the end of the 20th century fearful of himself, fearful of what he might be capable of, fearful for the future...In order to ensure that the new millennium now approaching will witness a new flourishing of the human spirit, mediated through an authentic culture of freedom, men and women must learn to conquer fear. We must learn not to be afraid; we must rediscover a spirit of hope and a spirit of trust...

The politics of nations, with which your organization is principally concerned, can never ignore the transcendent, spiritual dimension of the human experience, and could never ignore it without harming the cause of man and the cause of human freedom...

We have within us the capacities for wisdom and virtue. With these gifts, and with the help of God's grace, we can build in the next century and the next millennium a civilization worthy of the human person, a true culture of freedom. And in doing so, we shall see that the tears of this century have prepared the ground for a new springtime of the human spirit.

AT GIANTS STADIUM

COMPARED TO MANY OTHER PARTS OF THE WORLD, THE UNITED States is a privileged, privileged land. Yet even here there is much poverty and human suffering. There is much need for love and the works of love...

Is present day America becoming less sensitive, less caring toward the poor, the weak, the stranger, the needy? It must not! Today, as before, the United States is called to be a hospitable, hospitable society, a welcoming culture ...

Sadly, today a new class of people is being excluded. When the unborn child--the stranger in the womb--is declared to be beyond the protection of society, not only are America's deepest traditions radically undermined and endangered, but a moral blight is brought upon society ...

Do not make an idol of temporal reality. Know that the Kingdom of God is at hand. Wait for the Lord with courage, be stouthearted. Hope in the Lord! Amen.

--Reported by John Moody/New York

With reporting by John Moody/New York