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Title: Pope Francis attacks 'throw-away' economic globalization
Source:
Reuters
URL Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/2015 ... -economy-idUSKBN0LW0NZ20150228
Published: Feb 28, 2015
Author: James Mackenzie
Post Date: 2015-02-28 13:54:03 by Willie Green
Keywords: globalization
Views: 12336
Comments: 66
(Reuters) - Pope Francis launched a fresh attack on economic injustice on Saturday, condemning the "throw-away culture" of globalization and calling for new ways of thinking about poverty, welfare, employment and society. In a speech to the association of Italian cooperative movements, he pointed to the "dizzying rise in unemployment" and the problems that existing welfare systems had in meeting healthcare needs. For those living "at the existential margins" the current social and political system "seems fatally destined to suffocate hope and increase risks and threats," he said. The Argentinian-born pope, who has often criticized orthodox market economics for fostering unfairness and inequality, said people were forced to work long hours, sometimes in the black economy, for a few hundred euros a month because they were seen as easily replaceable. "'You don't like it? Go home then'. What can you do in a world that works like this? Because there's a queue of people looking for work. If you don't like it, someone else will," he said in an unscripted change from the text of his speech. "It's hunger, hunger that makes us accept what they give us," he said. His remarks have a special resonance in Italy, where unemployment, particularly among young people, is running at record levels after years of economic recession. The cooperative movement in Italy, whose roots go back to 19th century workers' associations, have long had close ties to the Catholic Church, with credit services, agricultural and building co-ops forming an important part of the overall economy. Pope Francis said they could help find new models and methods that could be an alternative model to the "throw-away culture created by the powers that control the economic and financial policies of the globalized world." Perhaps mindful of a wide-ranging corruption scandal linked to some cooperatives in Rome last year, he attacked those who "prostitute the cooperative name". But his overall message was that economic rationale had to be secondary to the wider needs of human society. "When money becomes an idol, it commands the choices of man. And thus it ruins man and condemns him. It makes him a slave," he said. "Money at the service of life can be managed in the right way by cooperatives, on condition that it is a real cooperative where capital does not have command over men but men over capital," he said.
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#5. To: Willie Green (#0)
I have begun to think this pope is the one that will finally destroy Roman Catholicism. Obviously a low-grade choice. He won't make one big mistake, IMO. The papacy is more likely to die a death by a thousand cuts.
Nah. He's just stating the old doctrines in a refreshing new way. The gates of Hell will not prevail against the Church, and Francis is one of the good guys.
He quoted his namesake, St Francis of Assisi, in calling money the “devil’s dung,” according to Vatican Radio. “When money becomes an idol, it controls man’s choices,” he added. “It makes him a slave.” This is far from the first time the Pope has addressed the condition of the working class in the globalized world; in a speech at the U.N. last year, the Pope asked world leaders to redistribute wealth. But won't redistribution of wealth via the UN actually be a way to drown the poor in this vile devil's dung that Francis has so much of personally? The Vatican is a hoard of looting. Maybe Francis should redistribute his own hoard before he lectures others.
#49. To: redleghunter, TooConservative, Bling Envy (#31)
The Vatican is a hoard of looting. Bling envy is an ugly thing. Don't be hating on the Pope, because prots are mediocre capitalists.
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#7. To: TooConservative (#5)
I have begun to think this pope is the one that will finally destroy Roman Catholicism.
#24. To: Vicomte13 (#7)
#31. To: TooConservative (#24)
The Vatican is a hoard of looting. Maybe Francis should redistribute his own hoard before he lectures others.
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