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Global og utviklingsrelatert forskning
UiB Global seminar

Vatikanets syn på fattigdom og økologi

De nye Bærekraftmålene: Tekniske giganter, men etiske dverger?

Pop Francis in Tacloban, the Philippines.
Pave Frans holder messe i kraftig regnvær og sterk vind i nærheten i Tacloban 17. januar i år. Etter messen besøkte han familiene til ofrene for tyfonen Yolanda.

Hovedinnhold

Hans Egil Offerdal
University of Bergen

In 1995 the UN General Assembly declared the period of 1997–2006 to be the First United Nations Decade for the Eradication of Poverty, with the aim of “translating all measures and recommendations into operational and concrete poverty eradication programmes and activities” (A/RES/50/107). However, despite the good intentions and proclaimed actions, poverty was not eradicated.

As a result, another UN resolution was proclaimed, with the years 2008-2017 set out to be the Second United Nations Decade for the Eradication of Poverty (A/RES/62/205). The resolution duly noted that “midway to the 2015 Millennium Development Goals target date, while there has been progress in reducing poverty in some regions, this progress has been uneven and the number of people living in poverty in some countries continues to increase, with women and children constituting the majority of the most affected groups, especially in the least developed countries and in particular in sub-Saharan Africa.”

This year (2015), the world will – by shameful assertions – “celebrate” the so-called realization of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). According to the UNs own numbers, about 1.2 billion human beings still live in poverty.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are the continuation of the world’s effort in making a human life for the world’s poor. The new 17 SDGs proclaim, among other things, to “end poverty in all its forms everywhere”; “protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss” as well as to “take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts.”

This presentation will look at Catholic criticisms/analysis at the achievements so far, as well as the new proposed goals, while noting that:

Perhaps the greatest challenge lays in the sphere of human values… inequality, global injustice, and corruption are undermining our ethical values, personal dignity and human rights. We need, above all, to change our convictions and attitudes, and combat the globalization of indifference with its culture of waste and idolatry of money.  We should insist upon the preferential option for the poor; strengthen the family and community; and honor and protect Creation as humanity’s imperative responsibility to future generations.

From the Statement of the Joint Pontifical Academy of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences Workshop on Sustainable Humanity, Sustainable Nature: Our Responsibility (May, 2014).

Hans Egil Offerdal has worked extensively with Catholic social teaching, recent Latin American church history and liberation theologies. He is co-editor (with Genaro Zalpa) of the book ¿El reino de Dios es de este mundo? el papel ambiguo de las religiones en la lucha contra la pobreza. Bogota, D.C., Colombia: Siglo del Hombre Editores, 2009.

Offerdal has worked and lectured at Instituto Tecnológico de Monterrey (Mexico) and Central Missouri State University. Offerdal acted as an Invited Observer to the Millennium Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual leaders United Nations, New York in 2000.