To the
personnel of the new
COMPLETE DEDICATION TO DEFENCE
OF HEALTH AND HUMAN LIFE
On Sunday, 20
December, the holy Father paid a visit to the new
Beloved Brothers and Sisters!
1.On my visit to the
But
my particularly affectionate thought cannot but be directed to the dear
patients in this institute, stricken by illness. To you who are suffering in
body and in spirit there go my good wishes, my understanding, and my
solidarity, which I intend to manifest also to your relatives here present, who
are deeply concerned and anxious about your health.
I
come to this hospital complex which was restructured and inaugurated in
1970. However, going back in the history
of Rome, it is connected with the Monastery of San Cosimato,
which from the 10th century was a centre of fervent religious life
and also of generous charitable undertakings, particularly in favour
of the sick and pilgrims, a concrete sign of that continuous active and
disinterested solicitude that the Church has always shown for the poor, the
humble, children and the sick.
Suffering and hope
2.This hospital - like all the hospitals of the world - is a
place of suffering and hope. As we enter
the wards, the rooms, we dramatically experience the weakness, the frailty of
our human nature, so exposed to a thousand dangers and threats, which can at
any moment break its harmonious balance, causing disease and weakening our
strength. The mystery of physical pain,
which torments man's spirit in one of the most agonizing questions, appears
here with all its intense impact. In
suffering man feels his loneliness become more acute, while his physical
strength fails him; the need of invoking others - relatives, friends, doctors -
to give him relief and comfort, the cry of supplication to God, who alone can
give complete help and also explain the meaning of so much suffering.
But
this place is also a place of hope: the hope of the sick themselves, who feel
that the beauty of life is insuppressible: the hope
of their relatives and friends, who share with them the confident expectation
of an improvement which will announce recovery in the near future.
While I express my wish that this hope will soon come true, I wish to
say to the brothers and sisters stricken by sickness, who are listening to me
at this moment: I have come to bear witness to the love that Christ, the Church
and the Pope have for you. Your suffering presence is not useless, far
less absurd, Christ the Lord, who in the Incarnation assumed, along with our
human nature, also pain and death, calls all men and especially you who are
weak and suffering, to collaborate with him for the salvation of the
world. This mysterious vocation of yours
to suffering is a vocation to love for God the Father of Mercy, and for other
brothers and sisters. Only Christ's
cross can illuminate our weak intelligence and give it a glimpse of the deep
meaning of the human and Christian fruitfulness of suffering.
In defence of health
and human life
3.A place of suffering which is accompanied by hope, a
hospital is also a place in which an effort if made to make this hope become a
reality as soon as possible. Medical
activity by its very nature is directed to defending life and improving the
health of any human being in difficulty.
The very ancient Hippocratic Oath already committed physicians to do
so. In a central passage, it ran "I will
have recourse to diet for the benefit of
my patients according to my capacities and judgement, not for their danger and
harm. And I will not give a deadly
potion nor will I take a similar initiative, whoever may ask me, in the same
way I will not give any woman a pessary for abortive
purposes".
Twenty-four centuries later, the “Geneva Declaration” approved in 1948
by the World Association of Doctors, proposes substantially identical concepts.
In it the one who assumes practice of the medical profession promises “I
solemnly undertake to dedicate my life to the service of humanity ... I will practice
my profession with consciousness and dignity. The health of my patient will be
my first concern. I will maintain the
utmost respect for human life right from the moment of conception”.
It
is precisely this unreserved dedication to the defence of health and human life
that is the origin of the special consideration universally attributed by
citizens to doctors and auxiliary personnel: while respecting all other work,
everyone willingly recognizes the social pre-eminence of a profession which has
as its aim the protection of a good which is the foundation and premise of all
other goods that can be enjoyed here below.
And
it is Holy Scripture itself that confirms this appreciation, recommending
“Honour the physician with the honour due him, according to your need of him”
(Sir. 38:1), and commenting on this
precept, it observes: “The skill of the physician lifts up his head, and in the
presence of great men he is admired” (ib. v. 3).
Certainly, for the believer the first and main source of hope, in the
case of illness, remains the help of the Lord, whose omnipotence can triumph
over any disease. For this reason the
page of the Bible quoted urges the sick to pray, to be purified and to offer
propitiating sacrifices (cf ib.
vv. 9-11). That does not exclude, however, the opportuneness of simultaneous recourse to the aids of the
medical art, whose beneficial function is also envisaged in the plans of Divine
Providence. For this reason, after the admonitions just recalled, Scripture
does not fail to recommend: “Give the physician his place for the Lord created
him, let him not leave you, for there is need of him” (ib.
v. 12).
Precious human life
It
is only right, therefore, that your profession, beloved doctors and members of
the paramedical and auxiliary personnel, should be held in high consideration.
It is only right, because the good that it intends to protect, the good of
human life, is a highly precious one.
Life
is the time that is granted to us to express concretely the potential riches
which each of us bears and to make our contribution to
the common progress of mankind. Life is
the time that is given to us to embody in ourselves and in history the values
of love, goodness, joy, justice and peace, to which the human heart aspires.
In
the light of faith, furthermore, life is the time of grace (kairos), in which God puts the
human being to the test, trying his heart and his mind, by the daily commitment
of believing, hoping and loving. A time
of grace, in which each one is called to enrich himself - by giving himself -
with values that last for eternity, which will be marked forever by the measure
of love which we have succeeded in expressing here below.
Life, therefore, is a precious good in its entirety and in every part of
it. Those who spend their energies to
defend it, to restore its normal efficiency, to promote its full development,
acquire the right to the gratitude of every fellow creature of theirs. On the contrary, those who dare to attack it
in any way stain themselves with a serious crime and incur the severe
condemnation of that judge against which there is no appeal: conscience, the mirror of God.
The
hope that I spontaneously express on the occasion of this significant meeting
is that, also today, anyone who chooses to put himself in the service of human
life will feel vibrating in him pride in belonging to a profession whose
members, throughout the centuries, have offered luminous testimonies of
generous humanitarianism, teaching, in some cases, the supreme heroism of
self-sacrifice to save their brother.
May
the thought of Christmas, which we are preparing to celebrate, strengthen these
wishes with the attraction that springs from the smile of a new-born Child in
his mother's arms.
The inspiring scene, which we will contemplate represented in the crib,
speaks to us all of a life that has just been born, which the warmth and
solicitude of loving hearts (Mary, Joseph, the shepherds) defend from the
dangers of a difficult situation.
May this message bring forth echoes of generous response in the hearts of Christians today, so that every human life may find around it, not indifference or rejection, but sympathy, welcome, interest and help. This is my cordial wish, which I accompany with the Apostolic Blessing, imploring so much serenity for you and for your dear ones.