Fraternity and social friendship

The encyclical’s title is a direct quotation from the Admonitions of St. Francis. It indicates a fraternity that extends not only to human beings, but also to the earth, in full harmony with his other papal encyclical, Laudato Si’.

Oct 10, 2020

By Fr Antonio Spadaro, SJ
Eight years after his election, Pope Francis has written a new encyclical that brings together many of his previous teachings (cf. Fratelli Tutti, No 5).

When he began his pontificate, the first idea Francis referred to was “fraternity.” He bowed his head in front of the people gathered in St Peter’s Square and defined the bishoppeople relationship as a “path of fraternity,” stating this desire: “Let us always pray for each other. Let us pray for the whole world, that there may be a great fraternity.”

The encyclical’s title is a direct quotation from the Admonitions of St. Francis. It indicates a fraternity that extends not only to human beings, but also to the earth, in full harmony with his other papal encyclical, Laudato Si’.

Fratelli Tutti addresses both fraternity and social friendship; together they are the central message of his text. The realism that runs through the pages dissolves any romantic emptiness that always lurks about whenever we speak of fraternity. For Francis, fraternity is not just an emotion, a feeling or an idea – no matter how noble – but a fact that also implies an outcome, an action (and the  freedom to act): “Whose brother can I be?”

Fraternity thus understood overturns the prevailing apocalyptic mentality, which is an approach to reality that fights against the world, believing it to be the opposite of God, i.e. an idol, and therefore needing to be destroyed as soon as possible to accelerate the end of time. Faced with the abyss of the apocalypse, there are no more brothers or sisters, only apostates or martyrs running against time. But we are not militants or apostates, we are all sisters and brothers.

Fraternity neither burns time nor blinds eyes and souls. Instead it occupies time; it takes time, time needed for a quarrel and reconciliation. Fraternity spends time; the apocalypse burns it. Fraternity requires the time of boredom. Hate is pure excitement. Fraternity is what allows equals to be different. Hate eliminates those who are different. Fraternity saves the time which involves politics, mediation, encounter, the building up of civil society, and caring. Fundamentalism wipes it out as in a video game.

That is why on February 4, 2019, in Abu Dhabi, Pope Francis and Ahmad al-Tayyeb, the Grand Imam of al-Azhar, signed a historic document on fraternity. The two leaders recognized each other as brothers and tried to take a look at today’s world together. And what did they understand? That the only real alternative that defies and curbs the apocalyptic solution is fraternity.

It is necessary to rediscover this powerful evangelical word, taken up in the catchcry of the French Revolution, but which the post-revolutionary order then abandoned until it was removed from the political-economic lexicon. It has been replaced with the weaker one of “solidarity,” which in Fratelli recurs 22 times (compared to 44 occurrences of “fraternity”). Francis wrote in one of his messages: “While solidarity is the principle of social planning that allows the unequal to become equal, fraternity is what allows the equal to embrace different people.”

Recognising fraternity changes our perspectives, turning them upside down. It is a strong message of political value. We are all brothers and sisters, and therefore all citizens with equal rights and duties, under whose shadow everyone enjoys justice.

So, fraternity is the solid basis for living “social friendship”, which combines rights with responsibility for the common good and embraces diversity with the recognition of a radical fraternity. ––La Civiltà Cattolica

Total Comments:0

Name
Email
Comments