VATICAN CITY, NOV. 3, 2009 (Zenit.org).- Globalization has brought about the international circulation of money, but human persons are still not free to circulate, the president of the Vatican’s migrant council observed.
Archbishop Antonio Vegliò noted the “walls of national boundaries” today when he presented the 6th World Congress for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Refugees.
The conference is scheduled for next Monday through Thursday, and will consider the theme:”A pastoral response to the phenomenon of migration in the era of globalization. Five years after the Instruction ‘Erga Migrantes Caritas Christi.'”
During the presentation, the archbishop reflected: “[G]lobalization has created a new labor market and, consequently, pushed many to emigrate, also to flee from poverty, misery, natural catastrophes and local and international conflicts, as well as from political or religious persecution. This has opened markets to international intervention, but it has not torn down the walls of national boundaries to allow the free circulation of people, with due respect for the sovereignty of states and their constitutional charters, safeguarding legality and security.
“The migration phenomenon, therefore, ‘raises a truly ethical question: the search for a new international economic order for a more equitable distribution of the goods of the earth.'”
Participants in the conference will consider these themes from a variety of areas of expertise.
There will be 14 main speakers, including Senator Giuseppe Schifani, president of the Italian Senate; William Lacy Swing, director-general of the International Organization for Migration; Laurens Jolles, regional representative for Europe of the U.N. High Commissioners Office for Refugees; and Jesuit Father Pierre Martinot-Lagarde, special adviser for Socio-Religious Affairs and Special Partnerships of the International Labor Organizaton.
In addition to 53 prelates, representatives of men and women religious, and national and international bishops’ conferences, there will also be delegates representing the Orthodox, Anglicans and Lutherans.
