Acta Benedicti Pp. XVI 365

environmental change and sustainable growth, and to draw up and apply

solutions at an international level. Particular attention must be paid to the

fact that the poorest countries are likely to pay the heaviest price for ecolo-

gical deterioration. In my Message for the 2007 World Day of Peace, I

pointed out that ''the destruction of the environment, its improper or selfish

use, and the violent hoarding of the earth's resources ... are the consequences

of an inhumane concept of development. Indeed, if development were limited

to the technical-economic aspect, obscuring the moral-religious dimension, it

would not be an integral human development, but a one-sided distortion

which would end up by unleashing man's destructive capacities''.4 In meeting

the challenges of environmental protection and sustainable development, we

are called to promote and ''safeguard the moral conditions for an authentic

'human ecology'''.5 This in turn calls for a responsible relationship not only

with creation but also with our neighbours, near and far, in space and time,

and with the Creator.

This brings us to a second challenge which involves our conception of the

human person and consequently our relationships with one other. If human

beings are not seen as persons, male and female, created in God's image 6 and

endowed with an inviolable dignity, it will be very difficult to achieve full

justice in the world. Despite the recognition of the rights of the person in

international declarations and legal instruments, much progress needs to be

made in bringing this recognition to bear upon such global problems as the

growing gap between rich and poor countries; the unequal distribution and

allocation of natural resources and of the wealth produced by human activ-

ity; the tragedy of hunger, thirst and poverty on a planet where there is an

abundance of food, water and prosperity; the human suffering of refugees and

displaced people; the continuing hostilities in many parts of the world; the

lack of sufficient legal protection for the unborn; the exploitation of children;

the international traffic in human beings, arms and drugs; and numerous

other grave injustices.

A third challenge relates to the values of the spirit. Pressed by economic

worries, we tend to forget that, unlike material goods, those spiritual goods

which are properly human expand and multiply when communicated: unlike

divisible goods, spiritual goods such as knowledge and education are indi-

4 No. 9. 5 Centesimus annus, 38. 6 Cf. Gen 1:26.