Amid an unprecedented combination of challenges facing the world today, Pope Francis on Christmas Day entreated that the Jubilee Year of Hope 2025 becomes an opportunity to forgive debts, especially of the poorest countries.
The solicitation reflects one of the main issues the Holy Father deals with in his message for the World Day of Peace being marked on 1st January, at the beginning of the Jubilee Year of Hope.
The message, entitled "Forgive Us Our Debts: Grant Us Your Peace", underscores the deep meaning of the Jubilee tradition that reminds us that we are all "in debt" to God, who in His infinite mercy and love forgives our sins and calls upon us to forgive those who trespass against us.
Recalling that in the Jewish tradition, the Jubilee was a special year of universal remission of sins and debts liberating the oppressed, the Pope notes that in our day too, this special year of grace "is an event that inspires us to seek to establish the liberating justice of God in our world," marred by injustices and "systemic" challenges that Saint John Paul II termed "structures of sin."
"The celebration of the Jubilee spurs us to make a number of changes in order to confront the present state of injustice and inequality by reminding ourselves that the goods of the earth are meant not for a privileged few, but for everyone," says the Pope.
Exploitation and oppression
The Pope reflects on the harm of cherishing the illusion that our relationships with others can be governed by a logic of exploitation and oppression, where might makes right. He cautions that today, in our interconnected global village, the international system, unless it is inspired by a spirit of solidarity and interdependence, gives rise to injustices, aggravated by corruption, which leave the poorer countries trapped.
"A mentality that exploits the indebted can serve as a shorthand description of the present 'debt crisis' that weighs upon a number of countries, above all in the global South."
Francis has repeatedly stated that foreign debt has become a means of control whereby certain governments and private financial institutions of the richer countries unscrupulously and indiscriminately exploit the human and natural resources of poorer countries, simply to satisfy the demands of their own markets.
In addition, different peoples, already burdened by international debt, find themselves also forced to bear the burden of the "ecological debt" incurred by the more developed countries.
"Foreign debt and ecological debt are two sides of the same coin, namely the mindset of exploitation that has culminated in the debt crisis. In the spirit of this Jubilee Year, I urge the international community to work towards forgiving foreign debt in recognition of the ecological debt existing between the North and the South of this world. This is an appeal for solidarity, but above all for justice," says the Holy Father.
He adds that the cultural and structural change needed to surmount this crisis will come about "when we finally recognise that we are all sons and daughters of the one Father, that we are all in his debt but also that we need one another, in a spirit of shared and diversified responsibility."
A new financial network
Francis renews the appeal launched by Saint John Paul II on the occasion of the Great Jubilee of the Year 2000 to consider "reducing substantially, if not cancelling outright, the international debt which seriously threatens the future of many nations".
The Pope's message says that in recognition of their ecological debt, the more prosperous countries ought to feel called to do everything possible to forgive the debts of those countries that are in no condition to repay the amount they owe. Naturally, lest this prove merely an isolated act of charity that simply reboots the vicious cycle of financing and indebtedness, a new financial framework must be devised, leading to the creation of a global financial Charter based on solidarity and harmony between peoples.
Speaking of systemic injustices and "interconnected" challenges, the Pope cites the inhuman treatment inflicted on migrants, environmental degradation, "the confusion wilfully created by disinformation, the refusal to engage in any form of dialogue, and the immense resources spent on the industry of war."
"Each of us must feel in some way responsible for the devastation to which the earth, our common home, has been subjected, beginning with those actions that, albeit only indirectly, fuel the conflicts that presently plague our human family," says the message.
Francis also asks for a firm commitment to respect for the dignity of human life from conception to natural death. "Without hope for the future, it becomes hard for the young to look forward to bringing new lives into the world. Here I would like once more to propose a concrete gesture that can help foster the culture of life, namely the elimination of the death penalty in all nations. This penalty not only compromises the inviolability of life but eliminates every human hope of forgiveness and rehabilitation."
A global fund against hunger
In addition, following in the footsteps of Saint Paul VI and Benedict XVI, Pope Francis makes yet another appeal, for the sake of future generations:
"In this time marked by wars, let us use at least a fixed percentage of the money earmarked for armaments to establish a global Fund to eradicate hunger and facilitate in the poorer countries educational activities aimed at promoting sustainable development and combating climate change. We need to work at eliminating every pretext that encourages young people to regard their future as hopeless or dominated by the thirst to avenge the blood of their dear ones. The future is a gift meant to enable us to go beyond past failures and to pave new paths of peace."
The Holy Fathers expresses the hope that 2025 be a year in which peace flourishes. "A true and lasting peace that goes beyond quibbling over the details of agreements and human compromises. May we seek the true peace that is granted by God to hearts disarmed: hearts not set on calculating what is mine and what is yours; hearts that turn selfishness into readiness to reach out to others; hearts that see themselves as indebted to God and thus prepared to forgive the debts that oppress others; hearts that replace anxiety about the future with the hope that every individual can be a resource for the building of a better world."