Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Vatican City (Fides Service) - “The event tourism should be seen not as one of many events of human activity but as a phenomenon inserted in a unitary and community understanding of humanity and society”, a projection of that “supreme principle which should govern human co-existence: respect for the dignity of every human being as a person created in the image and likeness of God”. These words were pronounced by Cardinal Stephen Fumio Hamao, president of the Pontifical Council for the Pastoral care of Migrants and Itinerant Peoples, when he presented Pope John Paul II’s Message for the Church’s 25th World Tourism Day with the title “Sport and Tourism, two vital forces at the service of reciprocal understanding”. Archbishop Agostino Marchetto, secretary of the Council was one of the speakers at the presentation at the Holy See Press Room.
“The Church looks with optimism at the phenomenon tourism and the gesture sports - the speakers said - despite the distortions and deviations they suffer today: sex tourism, anxiety for the atmosphere of fear in a world shaken by terrorism, exaggerated marketing. But these abuses should not be allowed to discourage or undermine the opportunity for a meeting between peoples and culture represented by tourism”.
The Pontifical Council for the Pastoral care of Migrants and Itinerant Peoples - the Cardinal said - promotes the Church’s World Tourism Day celebrated on 27 September all over the world “in the awareness that tourism is a planetary phenomenon with vast repercussions, also pastoral”.
“The Church has always shown appreciation for the values of tourism, a force which helps develop human co-existence (...) whereas suffering and problems derive from the practice of tourism without ethics”. “Pastoral of Tourism, therefore, finds its specific field of actuation, which is vast and demanding in the evangelising mission of the Church: to proclaim and carry the salvation of Christ to this dynamic of tourism”.
Commenting the Pope’s Message Japanese born Cardinal Fumio Hamao concluded: “Sport and tourism refer to elements considered the most characteristic and desirable for the wellbeing of the person. Both are seen as paths for development not only physical but also spiritual and cultural, of individuals and societies ”.
(PA) (Agenzia Fides 25/6/2004 lines 33 words 347)
