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Last month I conducted my first meeting as the new chair of our U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Inter-national Peace and Justice. 

This committee has a responsibility to assist the Bishops in the United States, individually and collectively, in advancing the social mission of the Church on issues of international peace and justice through policy development, education, advocacy outreach and acts of ecclesial solidarity, especially in the areas of human rights, human development, religious freedom and peace.

This meeting coincided with the 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights proclaimed on December 10, 1948 by the United Nations General Assembly. When the declaration was adopted the Soviet Gulag was in full swing and Mao's campaign for mass murder during the Cultural Revolution in China still lay in the future, along with Pol Pot's in Cambodia and the more recent genocides in Rwanda, Bosnia and the Congo. 
Far from proving that the declaration was in vain, however, such gruesome acts only show how necessary it was and still is.

The editors of The Tablet, an English Catholic magazine, suggest "it will take another 60 years and quite possibly much longer, before the civilizing values enshrined in the Declaration have become what they are said to be, universal. But these are not grounds for despair. The Declaration remains an indispensable beacon of modern civilization, pointing the way forward." 

The Declaration of Human Rights is universal precisely because it affirms the basic rights of every human being rooted in the inherent dignity of all the members of the human family. It becomes the organizing basis of global social life: no white rule over non-whites, no Aryan over Jew, no European colonists over non European colonized; no male superiority over female. 

The experience of the consequences of us vs. them divisions led to the creation of the Universal Declaration. 

In the late 19th century, as Rev. David Hollenbach S.J. notes in America, Catholic officials rejected modern human rights standards like freedom of religion because of the fear that such freedoms would relegate religious belief to the margins of society, and that the rights of individuals would undermine a commitment to the common good.

However, in his 1963 encyclical "Peace on Earth," Pope John XXIII presented a theology of human rights based upon the dignity of the person created in the image of God. 

Pope John XXIII supported the full range of human rights proclaimed by the Universal Declaration, both civil-political rights like those of freedom of speech and self -governance and social-economic rights like rights to food and health care. 

All these rights are necessary preconditions for world peace.

Equally important was the Second Vatican Council's 1965 "Declaration on Religious Freedom." Before the council, the Church feared that the civil right of freedom of religion could lead to religious relativism and undercut the truth of belief in Christ. 

The council's unequivocal affirmation of the right to religious freedom, however, appealed both to the Gospel and the universal requirements of human reason to affirm that all persons must be guaranteed civil freedom to exercise religious belief.

Thus, John XXIII and the Second Vatican Council set the church free to affirm the full range of human rights due to all persons and to open the way for a robust Church commitment to human rights.

That this commitment is being fulfilled was evidenced by the items on the agenda for our committee last month.

For example, the committee spoke with members of President-elect Obama's transition team on a wide range of issues of foreign policy on which the Bishops' conference has a formulated policy. 

• Iraq: that the war be ended and "a responsible transition" be effected at the earliest possible opportunity. A responsible transition needs to minimize the further loss of human life, address the humanitarian crisis in Iraq and the refugee crisis in the region, promote political reconciliation in Iraq and create international support for stabilizing Iraq, including engagement with Syria and Iran.

• Israel-Palestine: our Bishop's Conference has long supported a two state peace agreement and we urged the new Administra-tion to make this a major priority. We are also concerned about the needs and rights of the dwindling numbers of Christians in this troubled area.

• Global climate change: We ask that the United States government take greater initiative in working with the international community in combating global warming, with a special emphasis on assisting the poor in the most vulnerable developing nations to adapt to and mitigate the impact of climate change

• Nuclear weapons: We seek an aggressive posture on the part of the new administration to move forward in tackling issues of nuclear proliferation and the need for more verifiable disarmament

• Religious freedom: Religious freedom is of grave concern for the Church particularly in Iraq, India, Cuba, Venezuela and Viet Nam.

We hope to work cooperatively with President-elect Obama and his team in addressing these issues constructively.

Our committee also had a special presentation by Bishop Ambongo Besungu, Bishop Muteba Mugalu and Sister Marie-Bernard Alima who spoke to us passionately about the crisis in the Eastern region of the Democratic Republic of Congo. 

In what observers have called the world's deadliest conflict since World War II, five million people have been killed over the past fourteen years. During the past year, the conflict has caused about 45,000 deaths per month, mainly from disease, and has displaced over 250,000 more people.

To make matters worse, the incidents of systemic rape by armed groups has reached drastic proportions and reportedly are the worst in the world today. Many human rights groups consider acts committed in the Eastern Congo to be crimes against humanity.

The situation is exacerbated by the fact that remnants of the former Rwandan army and militias, allegedly responsible for the genocide in Rwanda, remain in the Eastern Congo and continue to cause havoc.

The bishops in Congo want the United Nations to stop the fighting, though they are under no illusion that the 17,000 UN peacekeepers stationed there are up to the task. This year, peacekeepers in Congo were implicated in atrocities rivaling those of the warring factions. 

In Eastern Congo, where the fighting has been most intense, the poorly trained UN troops refused to fight Tutsi rebels backed by neighboring Rwanda or the Hutu militias responsible for the Rwandan genocide who fled into Congo after their 1994 defeat.
Thus, the delegation is asking that the international community provide a stronger pacification and stabilization force for the area and seek to work with the country's leadership in fighting corruption, in supporting a strong civil government and in assisting the nation to reap the benefits of its many natural resources.

Our committee assured our guests of our ongoing policy of urging more U.S. foreign aid to the Congo, including: funding for the international peacekeeping force; helping the Congolese government to build a professional national armed force committed to respect the human rights of its people; and having the United States and other international partners engaged in intensive, high level diplomatic efforts with all the parties to the conflict to bring it to a peaceful resolution.

These issues I have cited, which were discussed by our Committee last month, are only a few of the manifold human rights issues which our bishop's conference and committee address regularly. Others include trade policy reform, debt relief, torture, trafficking in persons, violence against women, U.S.-Muslim engagement, the international fiscal crisis, mining and extractive industries and HIV/AIDS prevention and treatment in developing nations.

I think we can be proud of how our Church is such a staunch promoter of human dignity and rights throughout the world and that we do so from the time tested, track proven principles of Catholic social teaching.[[In-content Ad]]

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