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Posted by • 29/09/2015 • Printer-friendly

The Pope greets a young Bolivian in a recent visit to that country.

Pope Francis called for economic justice for the poor in some of his strongest language yet.

“You are social poets: creators of work, builders of housing, producers of food, above all for people left behind by the world market,” he told a crowd of Bolivian indigenous workers, farmers, and social activists. “You, the lowly, the exploited, the poor and underprivileged, can do, and are doing, a lot. I would even say that the future of humanity is in great measure in your own hands, through your ability to organize and carry out creative alternatives, through your daily efforts to ensure the three “L’s” (labor, lodging, land) and through your proactive participation in the great processes of change on the national, regional and global levels. Don’t lose heart!”

From afar, the words make it sound like Pope Francis is rallying at the barricades from the stage of Les Misérables. Throw in the fact that Bolivian President Evo Morales presented the Pope with a hammer-and-sickle crucifix, and it seems even socialist.

But context matters. Pope Francis did not give this speech while talking to the U.S. Congress or even in front of the United Nations. He was speaking in Bolivia, the poorest country in South America. He was also standing in front of Morales, an Aymara Indian who was wearing a jacket with a picture of Ernesto “Che” Guevara who is the country’s first president to come from its indigenous majority. And he was doing it on his first visit to a country that has had a troubled relationship with the Catholic Church of late.
http://time.com/3953802/pope-francis-bolivia/

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