A day after Pope Francis travelled to the birthplace of his namesake, St. Francis of Assisi, to sign his new encyclical, Fratelli Tutti or “Brothers All” in English, its contents were made public Sunday morning.
The 86-page document addressing issues urgent to the Roman Catholic Church and the world as it reels from COVID-19is largely a plain-spoken critique of a planet-plundering market economy and nationalist-populism.
“The best way to dominate and gain control over people is to spread despair and discouragement, even under the guise of defending certain values,” it reads.
Fratelli Tutti is also a plea for “the miracle of kindness” and “social dialogue for a new culture.”
Yet for a pope who welcomes “brothers and sisters” to his weekly addresses, the choice to call what is intended to be a morally authoritative document on how — through inclusion and treating all as equals — the world can emerge from the pandemic more peaceful, just and united, “Brothers All” is for many a maddeningly missed opportunity for gender-inclusive language.
The Vatican has defended the title as having remained faithful to a quote from St. Francis’s 13th-century “Admonitions,” guidelines for the poverty-avowing monk’s followers and the inspiration for the encyclical.
“The content of the document itself is more inclusive than any previous social encyclical has been,” said Anna Rowlands, a professor of Catholic social thought at Britain’s Durham University and the only woman on the Vatican panel that presented the encyclical Sunday morning.
Anna Rowlands, a professor of Catholic social thought at Britain’s Durham University, was the only woman on the Vatican panel that presented the encyclical. Pope Francis, she says, ‘has got some very sharp things to say about the way in which Catholics and the religious world often gets its own social interactions wrong.’ (Chris Warde-Jones/CBC)
“And for that reason, I’m pleased at the incremental progress that we’re making to think about gender really seriously in the church. It’s a step, right?”
Rowlands was given the challenging and — one can imagine — thankless task of trying to make the language inside the document more gender inclusive. (“Men and women” are found throughout, but so, too, is “fraternity” when friendship or solidarity would have been easy substitutes.)
The title controversy aside, Rowlands insists the power of Fratelli Tutti lies in the simplicity and joyfulness of the message, its critique of populism based on “the myth of security” in building walls and in its timing.
Encyclical comes in uncertain times
Its release comes not only during a global pandemic, but also in a ferociously polarized political moment with far-right populism on the rise and where many are deeply concerned about the survival of democratic institutions under U.S. President Donald Trump and others.
“[It] speaks directly to the context that many American Catholics are wrestling with at the moment … an election cycle which is dominated by a febrile kind of politics,” Rowlands said. The Pope, she added, “has got some very sharp things to say about the way in which Catholics and the religious world often gets its own social interactions wrong.”
The message that rings clearly throughout Fratelli Tutti is that tweaking the neo-liberal status quo as a solution to the problems that face the world today is delusional.
“As I was writing this letter, the COVID-19 pandemic unexpectedly erupted, exposing our false securities,” the Pope’s document reads. “Aside from the different ways that various countries responded to the crisis, their inability to work together became quite evident…. Anyone who thinks that the only lesson to be learned was the need to improve what we were already doing, or to refine existing systems and regulations, is denying reality.”
The faithful physically distance as Pope Francis leads a prayer from his window overlooking St. Peter’s Square on May 31 after months of closure due to the COVID-19 pandemic. (Vatican Media/Handout via Reuters)
As Francis often stresses in his addresses, Fratelli Tutti says faith must be expressed through action, a message that has broad appeal beyond the Catholic Church.
Maria Grazia Midulla, head of climate and energy for World Wildlife Fund Italy, said the Pope’s encyclicals have given environmental movements a power boost largely because he clearly links morality not to prayer or intention, but to action.
“He provides a great example of optimism. And if we’re really going to do something to try to improve things, we need to believe that things can actually get better,” she said. “We live in a time with so much conflict, so the Pope’s teaching us to consider ourselves as part of a community is also important.”
Pope moves toward ‘social gospel’
As many liberal world leaders have been replaced by far-right politicians in recent years, some observers say Francis’s messages are almost more eagerly received by the world’s centre-left than they are by many Catholics, who find his emphasis on social justice teetering on the edge of political activism.
“He hasn’t been reluctant to get mixed up in secular political movements in an explicit way,” said Vatican expert Francis X. Rocca, who covers the Holy See for the Wall Street Journal.
Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, right, meets the Pope in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican in April 2019. His latest encyclical makes a clear connection between what he considers an exploitative global market economy and the climate crisis. (Vatican Media/Handout via Reuters)
The Pope is far from progressive on issues such as abortion and same-sex marriage, and he approved a recent Vatican position paper on euthanasia and assisted suicide that describes both as “intrinsically evil … in every situation or circumstance” and accuses lawmakers of passing legislation allowing for them as “accomplices of a grave sin.”
Yet he also made clear from the outset of his papacy that teaching on personal morality would mostly be sidelined, telling an Italian journalist in 2013, shortly after his election, “We can’t always talk about these issues.”
Under Francis’s leadership, there’s been a move toward what Protestants call “the social gospel”: economic justice, including debt forgiveness for poor nations, land rights and support for migrants — all themes found in Fratelli Tutti and issues central to the life mission of the most recent Canadian who has been made a cardinal by Francis, Michael Czerny.
Francis’s June 2015 encyclical, Laudato Si, took on the fossil-fuel industry, calling for a sharp reduction in carbon-dioxide emissions, and as in Fratelli Tutti, it makes a clear connection between what he considers an exploitative global market economy and the climate crisis.
He’s met with everyone from members of Black Lives Matter to teenage environmental activist Greta Thunberg and supported movements in Latin America that have got him branded a Marxist by critics.
“What comparable figure on the left on that level is there in the world today?” Rocca asked.
Indeed, the interest by many non-Catholics in what Francis has to say — further distilled and rejigged to reflect a pandemic world in Fratelli Tutti — may be a reflection of the global shift to the right and a resulting hunger for a counter message, say observers.
“I’m not Catholic, but I respect and admire this Pope. I totally agree with him on the environment,” said Monica Cau, 49, a volunteer with Retake Rome, an association to encourage civic engagement that has some 15,000 members who meet weekly to do everything from cleaning graffiti off buildings and monuments to picking up garbage.
‘I’m not Catholic, but I respect and admire this Pope. I totally agree with him on the environment,’ says Monica Cau, a volunteer with Retake Rome, an association that has some 15,000 members who meet weekly to do everything from cleaning graffiti off buildings and monuments to picking up garbage. (Chris Warde-Jones/CBC)
“I’ll probably read the Pope’s new encyclical and read it to my 10-year-old daughter, as well,” Cau said, as she took a break from clearing an overgrown bike path with a group of Catholics and non-Catholics, including adults with disabilities, in a residential area of Rome.
“It’s important to look at the world from different perspectives.”
OTTAWA – Statistics Canada says wholesale sales, excluding petroleum, petroleum products, and other hydrocarbons and excluding oilseed and grain, rose 0.4 per cent to $82.7 billion in July.
The increase came as sales in the miscellaneous subsector gained three per cent to reach $10.5 billion in July, helped by strength in the agriculture supplies industry group, which rose 9.2 per cent.
The food, beverage and tobacco subsector added 1.7 per cent to total $15 billion in July.
The personal and household goods subsector fell 2.5 per cent to $12.1 billion.
In volume terms, overall wholesale sales rose 0.5 per cent in July.
Statistics Canada started including oilseed and grain as well as the petroleum and petroleum products subsector as part of wholesale trade last year, but is excluding the data from monthly analysis until there is enough historical data.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
VICTORIA – British Columbia is forecasting a record budget deficit and a rising debt of almost $129 billion less than two weeks before the start of a provincial election campaign where economic stability and future progress are expected to be major issues.
Finance Minister Katrine Conroy, who has announced her retirement and will not seek re-election in the Oct. 19 vote, said Tuesday her final budget update as minister predicts a deficit of $8.9 billion, up $1.1 billion from a forecast she made earlier this year.
Conroy said she acknowledges “challenges” facing B.C., including three consecutive deficit budgets, but expected improved economic growth where the province will start to “turn a corner.”
The $8.9 billion deficit forecast for 2024-2025 is followed by annual deficit projections of $6.7 billion and $6.1 billion in 2026-2027, Conroy said at a news conference outlining the government’s first quarterly financial update.
Conroy said lower corporate income tax and natural resource revenues and the increased cost of fighting wildfires have had some of the largest impacts on the budget.
“I want to acknowledge the economic uncertainties,” she said. “While global inflation is showing signs of easing and we’ve seen cuts to the Bank of Canada interest rates, we know that the challenges are not over.”
Conroy said wildfire response costs are expected to total $886 million this year, more than $650 million higher than originally forecast.
Corporate income tax revenue is forecast to be $638 million lower as a result of federal government updates and natural resource revenues are down $299 million due to lower prices for natural gas, lumber and electricity, she said.
Debt-servicing costs are also forecast to be $344 million higher due to the larger debt balance, the current interest rate and accelerated borrowing to ensure services and capital projects are maintained through the province’s election period, said Conroy.
B.C.’s economic growth is expected to strengthen over the next three years, but the timing of a return to a balanced budget will fall to another minister, said Conroy, who was addressing what likely would be her last news conference as Minister of Finance.
The election is expected to be called on Sept. 21, with the vote set for Oct. 19.
“While we are a strong province, people are facing challenges,” she said. “We have never shied away from taking those challenges head on, because we want to keep British Columbians secure and help them build good lives now and for the long term. With the investments we’re making and the actions we’re taking to support people and build a stronger economy, we’ve started to turn a corner.”
Premier David Eby said before the fiscal forecast was released Tuesday that the New Democrat government remains committed to providing services and supports for people in British Columbia and cuts are not on his agenda.
Eby said people have been hurt by high interest costs and the province is facing budget pressures connected to low resource prices, high wildfire costs and struggling global economies.
The premier said that now is not the time to reduce supports and services for people.
Last month’s year-end report for the 2023-2024 budget saw the province post a budget deficit of $5.035 billion, down from the previous forecast of $5.9 billion.
Eby said he expects government financial priorities to become a major issue during the upcoming election, with the NDP pledging to continue to fund services and the B.C. Conservatives looking to make cuts.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 10, 2024.
Note to readers: This is a corrected story. A previous version said the debt would be going up to more than $129 billion. In fact, it will be almost $129 billion.
NANAIMO, B.C. – Former Bank of Canada governor Mark Carney says he’ll be advising the Liberal party to flip some the challenges posed by an increasingly divided and dangerous world into an economic opportunity for Canada.
But he won’t say what his specific advice will be on economic issues that are politically divisive in Canada, like the carbon tax.
He presented his vision for the Liberals’ economic policy at the party’s caucus retreat in Nanaimo, B.C. today, after he agreed to help the party prepare for the next election as chair of a Liberal task force on economic growth.
Carney has been touted as a possible leadership contender to replace Justin Trudeau, who has said he has tried to coax Carney into politics for years.
Carney says if the prime minister asks him to do something he will do it to the best of his ability, but won’t elaborate on whether the new adviser role could lead to him adding his name to a ballot in the next election.
Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland says she has been taking advice from Carney for years, and that his new position won’t infringe on her role.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 10, 2024.
