Pope: Should humanity continue to inhabit the Earth? - Guest Post

Pope: Should humanity continue to inhabit the Earth? In a new preface, Pope Leo XIV warns of the dangers of a third world war fought piecemeal, nuclear weapons, and the deadly threat of global rearmament. Anna Kurian “Must the human species continue to inhabit the Earth?” Pope Leo XIV posed this radical question in a new preface released on Tuesday, July 21. In the text, he takes a hard look at the convergence of the “cyber domain and global rearmament.” The text features unusual references for a papal document, including citations of American musician Bob Dylan and Russian officer Stanislav Petrov. On Tuesday, the Vatican Publishing House released an Italian anthology of Pope Leo XIV’s addresses on peace. Titled Disarmed and Disarming: Peace Is a Gift, the book features an original preface by the Pope. He laments a world in which “a good 103 States are involved in some way, in a war on Earth.” Referencing singers and future saints The Pope hopes the truth will “push through” in the face of warmongering logic, affirming that “it is not atomic weapons that generate peace, but disarmament.” Faced with an arms race that “frightens and terrifies,” he quotes singer-songwriter Bob Dylan; in his 1963 song “Go Away You Bomb,” Dylan addressed the atomic weapon, writing, “I hate you cause yer man-made and man-owned an’ man-handled.” Speaking on behalf of the Church, Pope Leo XIV then asks an uncompromising question: “Must the human species continue to inhabit the Earth?” He adds, “The combination of the cyber domain and global rearmament impels one to seriously ask this question.” However, quoting Pope Pius XI, the American-Peruvian Pontiff notes that amidst these “present problems,” it “is no longer permitted to anyone to be mediocre.” The Holy Father holds up several role models, including Blessed Floribert Bwana Chui, a Congolese man killed in 2007 for resisting corruption; the former mayor of Florence, Servant of God Giorgio La Pira; and the American Catholic activist Servant of God Dorothy Day. For the Pope, peace is also embodied by “‘little-known protagonists’ who followed their own conscience.” The human conscience of Stanislav Petrov On this subject, the Successor of Peter refers to the story of Soviet officer Stanislav Petrov (1939–2017), who on September 26, 1983, “contributed to avoiding a possible global atomic war.” Petrov was on duty at a bunker near Moscow when the satellites he was monitoring sounded an alert: they had detected the launch of five intercontinental ballistic missiles from the United States toward the Soviet Union. However, the officer “disobeyed orders and chose not to signal the presumed attack.” “It was a decision that was made with the conscience of someone who knew that that simple gesture could have caused millions of deaths,” the Pope notes. History proved Petrov right, as it was actually an “error of the Soviet satellite detection system,” Pope Leo XIV recalls. He denounces the specter of a “truly frightening” world in which machines “decide to bomb defenceless people.” In contrast, the Pontiff affirms that “the conscience of a single person can be worth the entire world.” Urging the faithful to resist the “temptation to despair,” the Pope encourages everyone to “make peace his or her life’s cause.” Indeed, “peace is a responsibility” that falls to each and every one of us. It’s tempting to accuse others, he points out, but “peace instead, begins with me,” he insists. “We cannot ask the powerful people in the world for peace if we do not begin to live it out ourselves,” he explains. This doesn’t require grand gestures; instead, it starts in “our daily relationships” with the people around us. “Peace is built with small daily gestures,” he notes: “the gift of a smile, an injury pardoned, a kind word.”