«Every man is our brother, every woman is our sister, always. We want all to live together, as brothers and sisters in the Garden that is the Earth. The Garden of fraternity is the condition for all life»[i].
Thus began the Rome Declaration on Human Fraternity, drafted by 30 Nobel Peace Prize winners, signed by the Secretary of the Vatican State, H.E. Card. Parolin, and presented during the first Meeting on Human Fraternity, promoted on 10 June 2023 by the Vatican Foundation “Fratelli Tutti”.
This Foundation, led by the Vicar of His Holiness for Vatican City, Card. Mauro Gambetti[ii], clearly inspires its mission to the Encyclical of Pope Francis “Fratelli Tutti” and promotes the value of human fraternity through the culture of dialogue, the discovery of reciprocity and mutual enrichment.
One of the goals is the «globalisation de la Fraternitè»[iii] that can offer something positive to values such as freedom and equality because the freedom tends to shrink and wither without fraternity, while equality among all human beings can be a concretely attainable objective as a «result of the conscious and careful cultivation of fraternity»[iv].
On the 8th of March 1970, in a famous speech held during the Cologne Fraternity Week, the Nobel Prize winner for literature, Henrich Böll, invited to constantly remember the secular trinity (freedom, equality, fraternity) from which fraternity derives and from which it must be recovered precisely to allow everyone to be truly free and equal[v].
The fraternitè as the linchpin of the French Revolution and the Christian fraternitas (in particular, in this case, the fraternity described by Pope Bergoglio), also as the civic friendship theorized by Plato and Aristotle, as the fraternalism in the modern worker’s movements represent different historical uses of the ideal of fraternity, but with main and common constitutive elements: a relational bond, mutual aid and equality[vi].
The Foundation wants to reaffirm the fraternity as a value among communities, but also to promote it as a political, social and economic principle or idea. Nowadays fraternity has been forgotten and ii tends to be considered only a duty of solidarity for States to remove inequalities and pursue objectives of substantial equality[vii].
The inculturation of fraternity in society could lead individuals to accept the diversity and autonomy of the others, to recognize equal dignity for all human beings, to cultivate inclusive relationships and «experiences of proximity and contamination with each other»[viii]: there would be a need to rediscover fraternity in the world to win wars and abuses[ix].
We hope that a new time of fraternity will reawaken «the deepest and most deeply rooted desires» of the human soul and will truly lead us into our commitment to reduce inequalities and tolerate diversities; the human beings, who don’t deviate «towards barbarism», should always feel alive the social duty to pity the weak and the suffering and contribute to the conviction that politics «must make common life better and more fraternal and to ensure that the architecture of laws, of institutions and customs of this common life become a home for many brothers»[x].
Therefore, in the second edition of the World Meeting on Human Fraternity, entitled “#behuman”, held on 10th and 11th of May 2024 in Rome, the “Fratelli Tutti” Foundation has launched a work of spreading fraternity in the social, political and economic ecosystems[xi] through 12 working tables (sport, social cooperation, education, peace, children, health, sustainability and enterprise, work, agriculture, local government, information, social media) composed of experts, intellectuals, changemakers, entrepreneurs, researchers, scientists and representatives of institutions[xii].
The Foundation has two ambitious goals: making fraternity «a principle of social action in the public space»[xiii] and realizing a Charter of the human to reconstruct «a grammar of humanity, on which to base choices and behaviour […] to build up this spirtuality of fraternity»[xiv].
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References
[i] Declaration on Human Fraternity, Rome, St. Peter’s Square, June 10th, 2023. Available: https://www.fondazionefratellitutti.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Dichiarazione-sulla-fraternita-umana.pdf
[ii] https://www.fondazionefratellitutti.org
[iii] Joli, Michel. La fraternitè globale. Expliquée à ceux qui veulent changer le monde, èditions érès, Toulouse, 2021, 130.
[iv] The Holy Father Francis, Encyclical Letter on Fraternity and Social Friendship, Par. 103-104. Available: www.vatican.va
[v] Boll, Heinrich; Wolf, Christa. Fraternità difficile, Piccola Biblioteca morale, Edizioni e/o, Rome, 1999, 64-65.
[vi] Puyol, Angel. Political Fraternity. Democracy beyond freedom and equality, Routledge, New York, 2019, 59-60.
[vii] Mattioni, Angelo, Solidarietà giuridicizzazione della fraternità in Marzanati Anna, Mattioni Angelo (a cura di), La fraternità come principio del diritto pubblico, Città Nuova, Rome, 2007, 7-10.
[viii] Barbaro, Sergio, Fraternità e Common Law: il caso della responsabilità per “omissione di soccorso” in Cosseddu Adriana (a cura di), I sentieri del giurista sulle tracce della fraternità. Ordinamenti a confronto, Giappichelli, Torino, 2016, 96-97.
[ix] Zuppi, Matteo Maria, Odierai il prossimo tuo. Perché abbiamo dimenticato la fraternità. Riflessioni sulle paure del tempo presente, Piemme, Milano, 2019, 150-157.
[x] Maritain, Jacques, Cristianesimo e democrazia, Passigli, Firenze, 2007, 40-41.
[xi] About economy and fraternity: Punzi, Antonio, La convenienza del bene. Mercato, informazione e persuasione nella Caritas in veritate in Graziadio Serena (a cura di), Etica lavoro mercato. La Caritas in veritate, Aracne, Roma, 2011, 54-61.
[xii] Cardinale, Gianni, Francesco e i premi Nobel per la pace: dodici tavoli per un mondo più umano. Available here: https://www.avvenire.it/chiesa/pagine/francesco-e-i-premi-nobel-per-la-pace-dodici-tavoli-per-un-mondo-pi-umano
[xiii] Based on words of the Secretary of the Fratelli Tutti Foundation, Father S.I. Francesco Occhetta: “Incontro mondiale fraternità: padre Occhetta, “rimettere la fraternità come principio dell’azione sociale nello spazio pubblico”. Available here: https://www.agensir.it/quotidiano/2024/5/7/incontro-mondiale-fraternita-padre-occhetta-rimettere-la-fraternita-come-principio-dellazione-sociale-nello-spazio-pubblico/
[xiv] The Holy Father Francis, Address of His Holiness Pope Francis to the participants in the World Meeting on Human Fraternity, Clementine Hall, Saturday, 11 May 2024. Available here:
https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/speeches/2024/may/documents/20240511-world-meeting.html