One of Pope Francis’s top aides insists the Pope’s new encyclical on human fraternity has nothing to do with some critics' concerns that it’s about one-world government and watering down religious differences. Source: Crux.
“It’s absolutely not about naively, or disingenuously, marching towards that idea,” said Spanish Cardinal Miguel Ángel Ayuso Guixot, President of the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue.
“This isn’t about promoting some movements in the world that think in globalist terms about a ‘universal fraternity,’” Cardinal Ayuso said. “It’s nothing more than creating a space in which one’s identity can be affirmed by others, where understanding of the other can be developed and promoted, and where there’s sincerity of intention.”
Cardinal Ayuso, 68, was a key figure in the pope’s February 2019 visit to Abu Dhabi, where he signed a “Document on Human Fraternity” along with Sheik Ahmad el-Tayeb, the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, the most authoritative institution in the Sunni Muslim world.
Although Cardinal Ayuso emphasised that he hasn’t yet read the new encyclical, titled Fratelli Tutti and dedicated to the theme of human fraternity, he said he hopes it won’t be subject to the same political spin as Francis’s last encyclical, Laudato Si’, in 2016.
Cardinal Ayuso insisted that Francis’s core themes aren’t political, but applications of Catholic social teaching.
Pope Francis is scheduled to travel to Assisi, the birthplace of his namesake St Francis, to sign the encyclical on October 3.
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Vatican cardinal hopes spin won’t spoil potential of new papal encyclical (By John L Allen Jr, Crux)
