Faith leaders are vital allies in the quest for global peace in the face of rising hatred worldwide, both on and offline, UN Secretary-General António Guterres told the Security Council last week. “We must strengthen the values of compassion, respect and human fraternity anchored in international human rights norms and standards, and secure free and safe civic spaces; they are our best antidote to the poison of discord and division,” he said.
“This demands action by all of us – across international organisations, governments, civil society, and the private sector,” he added, “and it requires intervention by faith leaders everywhere.”
The Council met to discuss “the values of human fraternity in promoting and sustaining peace”, building on a 2019 declaration co-authored by Pope Francis and the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, Ahmed Al-Tayeb. The declaration urged religious and political leaders to end wars, conflicts, and environmental destruction.
Hatred is “an all-too-common denominator to the onset and escalation of conflict,” Guterres, a committed Catholic, told the meeting. “Around the world, we are witnessing a groundswell of xenophobia, racism and intolerance, violent misogyny, anti-Muslim hatred, virulent anti-Semitism, and attacks on minority Christian communities,” he said, suggesting that religious leaders have a duty to tackle hatred in their ranks. He urged the international community to take inspiration from the 2019 declaration, to “forge an alliance of peace, rooted in human rights and the values of human fraternity”.
Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher, delivering remarks on behalf of Pope Francis, lamented that “we are suffering from a famine of fraternity, which arises from the many situations of injustice, poverty and inequality and also from the lack of a culture of solidarity.” The worst effect is armed conflict and war, according to the archbishop who serves as the Vatican’s Secretary for Relations with States and International Organisations. He said, “The time has come to say an emphatic ‘no’ to war, to state that wars are not just, but only peace is just: a stable and lasting peace, built not on the precarious balance of deterrence, but on the fraternity that unites us.”
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