Pope tells CEOs: If you want to help the poor, empower them!

Dec 09, 2016

By Ines San Martin
Pope Francis has called on the world’s most powerful business people to work towards a more inclusive and equitable economic model, not just for the poor but with the poor, putting a human face on those in need.

“I pray that you may involve, in your efforts, those whom you seek to help; give them a voice, listen to their stories, learn from their experiences and understand their needs,” Francis said on Saturday, Dec 3.

“See in them a brother and a sister, a son and a daughter, a mother and a father. Amid the challenges of our day, see the human face of those you earnestly seek to help.”

Francis was addressing the participants of the Fortune+Time Global Forum that took place in Rome Dec 2-3. The list of VIPs taking part, both from the corporate and non-profit sectors, included IBM’s Ginni Rometty, Darren Walker of the Ford Foundation, Yang Yuanqing of Lenovo, Richard Branson of Virgin Group, Cathy Engelbert of Deloitte, Hugh Grant of Monsanto and Fisk Johnson of S.C. Johnson & Son.

Although the forum took place at a Roman hotel, Francis welcomed the group at the Vatican’s Apostolic Palace on Dec 3 morning, where he thanked them for promoting the “centrality and dignity of the human person” within their institutions and economic models and for drawing attention “to the plight of the poor and refugees, who are so often forgotten by society.”

When the cries of so many go ignored, the Pope said, they’re not only being denied their “God-given rights and worth,” but people are also rejecting “their wisdom and preventing them from offering their talents, traditions and cultures to the world.”

Preventing the poor and marginalised from being part of the solution makes them suffer even more, he said, and makes those in a position to help them grow impoverished, “not only materially, but morally and spiritually.”

Francis then said that, in a world marked by “great unrest,” where inequality continues to rise, many communities are affected by war, poverty, migration and displacement, “people want to make their voices heard and express their concerns and fears.”

The marginalised, the pontiff insisted, “want to make their rightful contribution to their local communities and broader society, and to benefit from the resources and development too often reserved for the few.”

Yet, the state of “great unrest” is, according to Francis, also a moment of hope: “For when we finally recognise the evil in our midst, we can seek healing by applying the remedy. Your very presence here today is a sign of such hope, because it shows that you recognise the issues before us and the imperative to act decisively.”

The Pope then said that there’s a need for institutional and personal conversion, “a change of heart” that prioritises humanity, cultures, religious beliefs and traditions.

This renewal, he then added, doesn’t only imply a change in market economies and improvements made to infrastructures.

“No, what we are speaking about is the common good of humanity, of the right of each person to share in the resources of this world and to have the same opportunities to realise his or her potential, a potential that is ultimately based on the dignity of the children of God, created in his image and likeness,” he said.--Crux Now