From the editor’s desk

Social teaching in action

Cafod, the Catholic Agency for Overseas Development, is a success story the Catholic Church in England and Wales can be proud of. Indeed, such is the quality of its staff that Lesley-Anne Knight, head of its international office, has just been elected secretary general of Caritas Internationalis, the world's second-largest aid organisation after the Red Cross. She succeeds Duncan McLaren, who in an interview with The Tablet just before its recent General Assembly called somewhat prophetically for a greater role in the organisation for women. He also questioned whether its internal structures were "fit for purpose", and Ms Knight made an urgent plea to the Assembly for their overhaul.

Caritas Internationalis' strength relies largely on the success of its constituent agencies, all 162 of them, such as Cafod in England and Wales and Catholic Relief Services in the United States. Its devotion to subsidiarity is admirable, and means that it can take on the distinct flavour of local churches. There is no doubt, for instance, that part of the success of Cafod comes from the sense of its ownership by the Catholic community in England and Wales. Merely to be the local branch of a vast international organisation would be to lose this distinctiveness. And in policy formation, unlike the more general character of the Catholic Church, ideas flow as freely upwards as they flow down. When Ms Knight calls for a new mandate,  she may find herself dealing with different expectations from the local grass roots than from the Vatican, with which Caritas Internationalis has formal links. But these are good tensions to have in an international body like this one.

On the other hand Caritas International may find itself punching below its weight in the global arena precisely because it does not have a single identity and a single name. It would surely be acceptable to Catholic supporters of Cafod, for instance, if it became known as Cafod-Caritas. Such a small adjustment would be an appropriate instance of the solidarity that is at the heart of the Cafod idea.

As well as structures, Ms Knight called for a new emphasis on climate change, specifically because it is emerging as a serious threat to the most vulnerable. This is the right emphasis for a Catholic contribution to the global warming debate. Climate change has claimed many real victims already. Caritas Internationalis and its agencies established their place alongside the weakest and poorest when they were among the first to tackle the HIV-Aids crisis in Africa, and they are now among the leading organisations providing drugs and treatment. News that the Caritas Jerusalem Gaza Medical Centre has had to close due to fighting between Palestinian factions is a stark reminder that not only disease and starvation but also political and ethnic conflict lies behind much suffering in the world - more die from such causes in Africa than from Aids. Ms Knight wants Caritas to build "conflict transformation programmes" so that these political and conflictual

causes of poverty are addressed. In short, the relief of suffering requires not just funding but political action and reform. This is indeed the constant message of the whole tradition of Catholic Social Teaching, of which Caritas Internationalis is fast becoming the very embodiment.