PRESENTATION OF POPE'S MESSAGE FOR 30TH WORLD PEACE DAY

VATICAN CITY, DEC 17, 1996 (VIS) - This morning in the Holy See Press Office, Cardinal Roger Etchegaray, president of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, presented Pope John Paul's Message for the 30th World Peace Day entitled "Offer Pardon, Receive Peace."

He was accompanied by Archbishop Francois Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan, Msgr. Giampaolo Crepaldi and Sr. Marjorie Keenan, R.S.C.M., respectively vice- president, undersecretary and official of this council.

The cardinal said: "If there is nothing more difficult than asking for pardon, there is nothing more sublime that offering that very pardon from the depth of one's heart. And yet it is this heroic gesture that John Paul II calls for in his Message for the 1997 World Peace Day."

"The Holy Father asks us," he continued, "in the very name of peace, to face lucidly our divisions, to weigh their evil effects with the aim of arriving at pardon. Strong in his unshakable faith in mankind, John Paul II dares to ask everyone to pardon and therefore, to be reconciled. even if pardon can never be imposed."

Cardinal Etchegaray pointed to the Pope's request for a "culture of peace" and asked: "Why not finally find the courage to unmask the deceptive evil of war and violence which never solve contrasts? ... When has violence ever led to a lasting peace? When, therefore, have acts of terrorism, the massacre of innocents, the death of the poor ever left behind the seed of peace?"

In conclusion, he affirmed: "Truth, justice and pardon: the three pillars on which rest the building of peace, all three are necessary, all three must be together. ... The pilgrimage of peace that the Holy Father invites us to undertake right from the start of 1997, begins and ends in the heart of each person and of every people, and pardon is one of its significant steps."
OP/PEACE DAY MESSAGE/ETCHEGARAY VIS 961217 (320)