John Paul II’s Solidarity with the Countries of the Third World

The author pinpoints that the Church is one of the subsystems of the universal society, and in recent years Her authority has grown in the world. She is a moral power acknowledged by many people of various outlooks and religions. The Church has taken part in solving acute problems of the whole mankind. One of them is a solidary universal development, overcoming considerable disproportions between South and North, which problem bears a structural and moral character. Two encyclicals have been devoted to this problem: Paul VI’s Populorum progressio and John Paul II’s Sollicitudo rei socialis. John Paul II develops and renders more profound the subject-matter of the concept of man’s integral development and solidary development of mankind as it is found in Populorum progressio. He shows in Sollicitudo rei socialis the development not only in the perspective: person − nation − human society, but also in the perspective of particular countries, rich and poor alike. Development is „measured and directed in tune with man’s calling viewed in a total (integral) manner” (no 29). At this level development implies exercising man’s rights (a right to live and develop) and fulfilling duties. At the national level a true development consists in respect for subjectivity and rights based on man’s transcendental calling, justice, independence and the respect for the nation’s right to develop. At the international level a genuine development consists in a total respect for the identity of every people along with its historical and cultural characteristics. The development at these three levels requires an acceptance of common good and of the whole human family as well as practising solidarity. John Paul II regards the latter as a virtue which consists in „A firm and permanent will to engage for the sake of common good” (no 38). In the second part of his paper the author writes about the coefficients of underdevelopment. Aside to some economic and social domains of underdevelopment even more worrying are the domains of culture linked with the systems of values. To the coefficients of underdevelopment belong the following: illiteracy, a difficulty in accomplishing higher education, inability to participate in edifying one’s own nation, various forms of economical, social, political, religious exploitation and oppression of a person and his rights as well as any kind of discrimination. Another negative coefficient that has not been solved yet is the following: East−West, arms race, military conflicts, imperialism, neocolonialism and international debt. The economical crisis and unemployment are also included here. In the third part the author deals with the coefficients of development, that is, positive aspects which he finds in Sollicitudo rei socialis. The first one of them is people’s awareness of their own and other person’s dignity; the second one is a conviction of a radical interrelation, and in consequence, solidarity which induced to overcome the plague of wars, egoism, and on the other hand, to make efforts and engage (all for all). The third aspect is a respect for life, opposing abortion and euthanasia. Linked with that is a care for peace and conviction that it will be undivided. Peace is a work of justice, solidarity and development. Closing up the author is convinced that despite a pretty pessimistically outlined image of the contemporary world there are no grounds for despair and passivity. All people of good will have been called up by John Paul to restore this situation