On December 10th we will celebrate the 75th anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of the International Bill of Human Rights.
On January 15, 1981, p. Alexander Schmemann wrote in his diary:
President Carter's farewell address was televised last night. Full of balance, of nobility of views on the ideals of America.
“(…) America did not create human rights… The opposite is true: human rights created America.” All this is partly rhetoric, but it is not a lie. The key is always the same: the person. If the person is not put at the center, nothing happens. [1]
This 75th anniversary is the opportunity to once again underline the significance of the person. We would like to celebrate it by recalling two reflections; the first by Saint John Paul II, Pope, and the second by Philip Allott, professor emeritus of international law at the University of Cambridge.
The first text is taken from number 13 of the Encyclical Centesimus Annus and helps us to deepen the concept of person. The second presents Allott's thought in his rereading of international law as the law of every human society and of every human being.
The encyclical states that a structural anthropological error is to reduce man to a series of social relationships. In this way the concept of the person as the autonomous subject of moral decision disappears. The document goes on to say:
From this mistaken conception of the person there arise both a distortion of law, which defines the sphere of the exercise of freedom, and an opposition to private property. A person who is deprived of something he can call "his own", and of the possibility of earning a living through his own initiative, comes to depend on the social machine and on those who control it. This makes it much more difficult for him to recognize his dignity as a person, and hinders progress towards the building up of an authentic human community.
In contrast, from the Christian vision of the human person there necessarily follows a correct picture of society. According to Rerum novarum and the whole social doctrine of the Church, the social nature of man is not completely fulfilled in the State, but is realized in various intermediary groups, beginning with the family and including economic, social, political and cultural groups which stem from human nature itself and have their own autonomy.
If we then inquire as to the source of this mistaken concept of the nature of the person and the "subjectivity" of society, we must reply that its first cause is atheism. It is by responding to the call of God contained in the being of things that man becomes aware of his transcendent dignity. Every individual must give this response, which constitutes the apex of his humanity, and no social mechanism or collective subject can substitute for it. The denial of God deprives the person of his foundation, and consequently leads to a reorganization of the social order without reference to the person's dignity and responsibility. The atheism of which we are speaking is also closely connected with the rationalism of the Enlightenment, which views human and social reality in a mechanistic way. Thus there is a denial of the supreme insight concerning man's true greatness, his transcendence in respect to earthly realities, the contradiction in his heart between the desire for the fullness of what is good and his own inability to attain it and, above all, the need for salvation which results from this situation.”
Allot's reflection takes up the theme of transcendence and develops it in the light of loving.
… Even before the law, it is love….
A society that is formed in law and through law comes to truly conceive of itself as a society. Humankind, thus conceiving its history and its future, discovers its humanity and its meaning.
Being human means loving. (…) It is out of love for our children that we work to respond to their needs, that we guarantee their growth and development. It is because of the love for our society that we want it to survive. (…)
It is crucial to define this love that pushes the conscience to want the right.
Once again we realize how much vocabulary can be a source of misunderstandings.
Although Molière's language distinguishes law (droit) from justice (justice), he makes no formal distinction between love for one's spouse (« aimer » son épouse) and love for a place or something (« aimer » un restaurant).
This is not the case, however, with the language of Socrates who defines justice and law with the word Dikè -, but gives love three names: Eros, Philia and Agapèei. (…)
According to Allott, all manifestations of love are linked to the Law as vehicles of transcendence. In fact, law acts on society as love acts on the individual: it allows us to overcome ourselves to reach others. (…)
In other words, Allott believes that love reconciles the desire to do something for someone with the obligation that moves the person in the same direction, that is, caring for one's neighbor or oneself. It is in love that conscience gives meaning to solitude, marriage, being children, friendship, studies, religion, politics, work, pleasure, celebration, commerce, war, peace.
This is the vision of a system of laws according to which humanity conceives of itself as a society that constantly and consciously works towards its own transcendence. [2]
Photography: "Rejoice" Sieger Köder (1925 – 2015 )
[1] A. Schmemann, Diari 1973-1983, Lipa, Roma 2021, Vol. II, p. 305.
[2] Tratto da François Larocque, « Eumonia et le droit selon Allott », in Revue générale de droit, Vol 31, N° 2, 2001
