St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City. / Credit: Alexander_Peterson/Shutterstock
Rome Newsroom, Jun 5, 2023 / 12:20 pm (CNA).
Nobel laureates, Grammy-winner Andrea Bocelli, and several former heads of state will join Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Square on Saturday night for the World Meeting on Human Fraternity.
The June 10 event, called “#Not Alone,” will culminate with Pope Francis signing a document calling for a commitment to human fraternity drafted by a dozen Nobel Peace Prize winners together with representatives of former Nobel Prize-winning organizations.
Young people representing different countries will also form “a symbolic embrace” by joining hands in a ring around St. Peter’s Square, according to the Fratelli Tutti Foundation, the sponsor of the event.
Cardinal Mauro Gambetti, the archpriest of St. Peter’s Basilica, described the upcoming meeting as “a great day of celebration and unity inspired by Pope Francis’ encyclical Fratelli Tutti, transcending a vision that restricts social friendship to ethnic or blood ties.”
Speaking at a Vatican press conference promoting the event, Jesuit Father Francesco Occhetta, the head of the Fratelli Tutti Foundation, noted that participants in the event “will be given as a gift a piece of organic soil and seeds to plant and germinate as a symbol of the commitment to guard fraternity.”
Nobel laureates who have confirmed their participation in the World Meeting on Human Fraternity include Iraqi human rights advocate Nadia Murad, Congolese gynecologist Denis Mukwege, and Yemeni Arab Spring leader Tawakkol Karman.
The former presidents of Colombia, Costa Rica, Poland, and Democratic Republic of East Timor — all peace prize winners — will also participate, as well as representatives of several U.N. organizations that have been past recipients.
The World Meeting on Human Fraternity will begin with private meetings of five working groups representing Nobel laureates, the poor, environmentalists, students, and associations.
At 4 p.m. local time, Italian TV presenter Carlo Conti, the former host of Italy’s national Eurovision competition, will kick off an Italian television broadcast of the World Meeting on Human Fraternity event in St. Peter’s Square with performances by Bocelli and other Italian musical artists.
Pope Francis will join the event two hours later to listen to what emerged in the working group discussions, sign the human fraternity document, and join the symbolic embrace. Later, circus performers and street artists will take to the stage in St. Peter’s Square to perform until 10 p.m.
Town squares in Buenos Aires, Argentina; Jerusalem; Nagasaki, Japan; Brazzaville, Republic of Congo; and four other locations in the world will connect live to St. Peter’s Square for the event.
The following is a list of Nobel laureates and Nobel laureate representatives who will participate in the World Meeting on Human Fraternity, according to the Vatican:
Juan Manuel Santos, president of the Republic of Colombia from 2010 to 2018 (Colombia): Nobel Peace Prize in 2016 for his resolute commitment to ending the civil war that has affected his country for 50 years.
Oscar Arias Sánchez, president of the Republic of Costa Rica from 1986 to 1990 and from 2006 to 2010 (Costa Rica): Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1987 for his efforts in promoting peace and stability in Central America, in particular for his efforts to end conflicts in the region and promote dialogue and cooperation between countries.
Lech Wałęsa, president of the Republic of Poland from 1990 to 1995 (Poland): Nobel Peace Prize in 1983 for his nonviolent struggle for human rights and free trade unions in Poland. As leader of the Solidarność trade union, he played a key role in the rights of workers and in the promotion of democracy in his country.
José Ramos-Horta, president of the Democratic Republic of East Timor (East Timor): Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1996 for his work in favor of a just and peaceful solution to the conflict in East Timor.
Jody Williams, founder of the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) and president of the Nobel Women’s Initiative (United States): Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1997 for work on banning and clearing landmines.
Shirin Ebadi, president of the Defenders for Human Rights Centre (Iran): Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 for her commitment to the defense of democracy, human rights, and especially women and children in Iran.
Muhammad Yunus, founder of Grameen Bank (Bengals): Nobel Peace Prize in 2006 for his work in promoting economic and social development through the concept of microcredit. Through the Grameen Bank, he provided affordable finance to the poor and helped improve their living conditions.
Leymah Roberta Gbowee, president of Gbowee Peace Foundation Africa (Liberia): Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2011. As a leader of the Liberian women’s movement, she played a vital role in ending the civil war and promoting reconciliation in her country.
Tawakkol Karman, leader of the Arab Spring (Yemen): Nobel Peace Prize in 2011. As a journalist and activist, he defended human rights, democracy, and freedom of expression in his country.
Denis Mukwege, gynecologist (Democratic Republic of Congo): Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2018 for providing medical care and support to women victims of sexual violence in times of war and armed conflict.
Nadia Murad Basee Taha, president and co-founder of Nadia’s Initiative (Iraq): Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2018 for her efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war and armed conflict.
Giorgio Parisi, vice president of the Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei (Italy): Nobel Prize in Physics in 2021 for the discovery of the interaction between disorder and fluctuations in physical systems, from the atomic to the planetary scale.
Maria Angelita Ressa, president of Rappler Inc. (Philippines): Nobel Peace Prize in 2021 for efforts to safeguard freedom of expression.
International Peace Bureau (IPB): Organization Nobel Peace Prize in 1910 for liaising between the peace societies of various countries and helping them organize world meetings of the international peace movement. Represented by Philip James Jennings, president.
American Friends Service Committee (AFSC): Organization Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1947 for its pioneering work in the international peace movement and compassionate effort to alleviate human suffering, thereby promoting brotherhood among nations. Represented by Hector Manuel Cortez, deputy secretary general.
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR): Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to the organization in 1954 and 1981 for its commitment to heal the wounds of war by providing aid and protection to refugees from all over the world and for the promotion of the fundamental rights of refugees. Represented by Filippo Grandi, high commissioner.
United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF): Organization Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1965 for its commitment to strengthening solidarity between nations and narrowing the gap between rich and poor states. The organization is dedicated to promoting and advocating for the rights of children, working to improve their health, education, and well-being around the world. Represented by Bo Viktor Nylund, special representative.
International Labour Organization (ILO): Nobel Peace Prize Organization in 1969 for having created international legislation that ensures certain standards for working conditions in each country. Represented by Gianni Rosas, ILO office director for Italy and San Marino.
International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW): 1985 Nobel Peace Prize-winning organization to disseminate authoritative information and create awareness of the catastrophic consequences of a nuclear war. Represented by Kati Riitta Maria Juva, co-president, and Onazi David, co-chair.
Peace Operations, United Nations Peacekeeping Forces: Nobel Peace Prize Organization in 1988. Its mission is to prevent armed clashes and create the conditions for negotiations between countries in conflict. Represented by Aroldo Lazaro Saenz.
Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs: Organization awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1995 for its efforts to diminish the role of nuclear weapons in international politics and, in the long term, for the elimination of nuclear weapons. Represented by Paolo Cotta Ramusino, general secretary.
International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL): Organization awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1997 for its work in banning and clearing landmines. Represented by Tun Channareth, ICBL world ambassador, and Denise Coghlan, RSM, member of the board of directors.
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA): Organization awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2005 for its efforts to prevent the use of nuclear energy for military purposes and to ensure that nuclear energy for peaceful purposes is used as safely as possible. Represented by Jacek Andrzej Bylica, IAEA chief of staff.
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC): Organization awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 for its efforts to build and disseminate greater knowledge of man-made climate change and to lay the foundations for the measures necessary to counter them. Represented by Hoesung Lee, president.
Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW): Organization Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2013 for efforts to eliminate chemical weapons. Represented by Odette Melon, vice general manager.
International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN): Nobel Peace Prize-winning organization for its work to draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons and its pioneering efforts to achieve a treaty-based prohibition of such weapons. Represented by Daniel Högsta, interim executive director.
Center for Civil Liberties: Nobel Peace Prize Organization in 2022. It has been promoting the right of expression and fundamental rights of citizens for many years. It worked hard to document war crimes, violence, and abuses of power. With its work, it demonstrates the importance of civil society for peace and democracy. Represented by Oleksandra Matvijchuk.
United Nations: Nobel Peace Prize Organization in 2001 for its work for a more inclusive and peaceful world. Represented by Miguel Angel Moratinos, undersecretary-general of the United Nations, who contributed to the creation and launch of the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations (UNAOC) in 2005 and since 2019 has held the position of high representative of the UNAOC.
Oley Back Road, representing Ellen Johnson Sirleaf: Nobel Peace Prize winner in 2011 for her nonviolent fight for women’s safety and their right to full participation in peacebuilding.
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At some point, Catholics (and their priests and bishops), need to do more than impotently ask police to take the microphone and ask their congregations to leave.
This was a Good Friday celebration in progress. In most jurisdictions, it is a criminal offence to interrupt a worship service in progress, and police ought to have been firmly reminded of that fact. At a minimum, it would have bought the congregation time until the service ended.
At that point, the police could ticket whomever they wished, and the entire community ought to have been rallied to support the ensuing legal challenges and/or pay any resulting fines.
The utter fecklessness, underlined by the spectacle of police officers being allowed to wander about the Sanctuary as if it were a kitchen in a domestic abuse call, was appalling.
Enough is enough.
England has always had issues with Catholics…
Well since 1534 anyway.
Friends in London and Dublin have told me of packed services at various Mosques, so it seems unfair this should happen at Christ the King Church in Balham. Today in London thousands marched for some cause (no idea what). Pray for the misguided.
As an American of English descent, and a life-long Anglophile, it has been my sad observation that the Brits went over the the dark side in attacking civil rights some time ago. The heinous lock downs and extreme over-sensitivity of any criticism of Muslim residents for example, even when violence and other actions would make such comment warranted, could result in your arrest and imprisonment.Now they are shutting church services. The long lauded “rights of Englishmen” have collapsed and been eradicated in favor of political correctness. We cannot feel superior here however as the same virus has now infected us. This has been seen in the loss of constitutional rights, courts making decisions which abrogate clearly written law, and targeting the church and anyone who professes Christian moral positions with as much oppression as possible. Even a simple baker is not immune to MULTIPLE prosecutions for the same “offense”.An opposite political opinion is not allowed. If the Emperor is not wearing any clothing, better for your own survival not to say so. There ARE no unaccompanied minors at the border, so dont film them; Biden is NOT in dementia although he cant complete sentences and walk up stairs; and if church services ARE constitutionally protected, we will pretend not to know, so keep those church doors SHUT. The Brit’s cousins the Australians conducted aligned anti Catholic activities when they jailed Cardinal Pell for a year, all the while ignoring clear evidence of his innocence of sex abuse charges. People of good will and moral compass need to push back at “woke” culture and leftist over-reach wherever it is found, before it is too late. Write a letter or email and take to task corporate heads like those at Coke, Hallmark, Delta, Chase Bank, and others who are supporting leftist suppression. Let them know you oppose the slippery slope we are now witnessing, and will boycott their products. A company may chose not to support a certain candidate. But inevitably, they will then PREVENT that candidate from speaking to YOU, or speaking out on what HAD been “public platforms”. It is stunning that the former president of the US has been stripped of public communication simply because the left doesnt approve of him. That is NOT freedom of speech. My advice —speak up NOW while you still can.This action in London is the exact opposite of freedom of religion. We have our own battles to fight here.
It’s going to take nothing short of a worldwide counter-revolution to fix this– and those currently calling the shots are doing their best to provoke one.
I read about this incident just prior to attending Easter Vigil Mass this evening. As we sang I expected the police to charge in. Our wonderful Priest suggested an Encore. Stand firm in faith.
As the Editor of Crisis Magazine, Eric Sammons, noted, the lockdowns will not end until we actively defy and ignore them. There are not enough police and prison cells to enforce laws rejected by everyone. At this point in time Lockdown regulations demand from us the same level of obedience as Jim Crow and the race laws of the Apartheid regime-that is to say, none at all.
The “laws” are unjust. Don’t call something that which it is not. A law is – by nature – just. An unjust law is not a law, but is a perversion of law.
What angered me is how the police so rudely entered and then hovered the sanctuary. No respect at all. Very unprofessional.
What the people at that parish should have said was “So we being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.”
One body in the whole church doesn’t exceed the legal limits.
And if the government insists that a woman can become a man just because she says so, and vice versa, then who are they do tell us that we are not one body? Unlike the people who think they can change their sexes, this has the virtue of being true.
The Great Reset steadily makes its new order way towards fascism. The so called science presented as definitive by lockdowners is anything but. We live in a time of neo Gnosticism, there is only one way and the self proclaimed practitioners, which includes those making fortunes from the new order, parade their fraudulent wisdom.
Unfortunately, too many in the leadership of Church are willing to cooperate with the fraud. The «law» is truly become a fear driven ass.
The Commies wouldn’t dare do that in Poland during thei dictatorship; it might start a local uprising.
When I visited Poland in 1979 shortly after St. John Paul II’s first visit, there were still road-side yellow and white bunting along the roads that he travelled as well as the cross erected in Warsaw’s Victory Park where he offered Mass.
What surprised me were the road-side shrines erected between the two World Wars when Poland was a free country still untouched after almost 35 years of Communist dictatorship.
You could tell a Party building by the small red sign next to the main door. One small building which appeared to have been built before World War II had the obligatory red sign and on the side of the building a life-size crucifix!
Big Caeser with his fines!
Never been to that side of the pond but have always found it puzzling, here, how the law ignores certain blatant lawlessness in front of their faces, yet picks on those easy targets in society.
Before God, these Police Officers committed a grave Sacrilige for which they will answer to God when they are judged by the severe Justice of the Omnipotent. The Iscariot who reported the Good Friday services, is in a serious sinful condition before God, as the Police interrupted the service right at the veneration of the Cross of our salvation.
Unfortunately the vast majority of the world’s bishops and priests have created the conditions where the police thought they could get away with this fascist behaviour, by meekly accepting without demur the civil authorities’ wrongful assertion of the right to dictate how, and even whether, religious rituals can be conducted inside a place of worship. Or even declare which religious rituals are essential and which are not! 12 months ago the pope and bishops should have loudly declared NO! The State can, at the very most, suggest to religious leaders any restrictions that the religious leaders might choose to impose on their own rites for the sake of public health.
And the compliant reaction of the priest and congregation was very disappointing. They should have told the police, “you’re not coming in here unless it’s to join in the act of worship. If the state health department has any concerns about public health relating to this religious activity, then health officials (not armed police!) can make an appointment to discuss them with the priest at some other time when he’s not conducting a religious service.”
Notable that the police not only singled out Catholics for this brutal and bigoted treatment, but also racism in singling out a small migrant community.
Children at the service were terrified. But I wonder if the reason some congregants didn’t react was that they thought it was some modernist reinterpretation of a Passion Play with armed police taking the role of the pagan Roman soldiers.