THE Pope, accusing the world’s multilateral institutions of failing to uphold stability and peace, has called for a new “diplomacy of hope” to ensure truth, forgiveness, and justice.
He also urged united world efforts to resolve conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza, and a final end to all forms of slavery and exploitation.
“We see increasingly polarised societies, marked by a general sense of fear and distrust of others and of the future, which is aggravated by the continuous creation and spread of fake news. This phenomenon generates false images of reality and a climate of suspicion that foments hate, undermines people’s sense of security, and compromises civil coexistence and the stability of entire nations,” Pope Francis told diplomats accredited to the Holy See on Thursday.
“A diplomacy of hope is consequently, above all, a diplomacy of truth. If the link between reality, truth, and knowledge is missing, human beings will no longer be able to speak and understand one another, because the foundations of a common language, anchored in the reality of things and therefore universally comprehensible, are lacking.”
The Pope said that his annual meeting with ambassadors was intended as a “family event” and a chance “to leave behind the disputes that divide us and instead to find out what unites us”.
This was especially important, he said, during the RC Church’s current Jubilee Year, inaugurated on Christmas Eve (News, 3 January), which offered an opportunity to “pardon offences, support the weak and the poor, give rest and relief to the earth”, and “rethink relationships” and find ways “to overcome the logic of confrontation and embrace instead the logic of encounter. In face of the increasingly concrete threat of a world war, the vocation of diplomacy is to foster dialogue with all parties, including those interlocutors considered less ‘convenient’ or not legitimised to negotiate.
“Only in this way is it possible to break the chains of hatred and vengeance that bind and to defuse the explosive power of human selfishness, pride, and arrogance, which are the root of every destructive determination to wage war.”
He said that there was also an “urgent need” for good news at a time when humanity had gained “progress, development, and wealth” but also felt “lonely and lost”, and when the natural human search for knowledge was being undermined by the “denial of self-evident truths” and manipulative misuse of media.
“Some distrust rational argumentation, believing it to be a tool in the hands of some unseen power, while others believe they unequivocally possess a truth of their own making, and are thus exempt from discussion and dialogue with those who think differently,” the Pope explained.
“Modern scientific progress, especially in the area of information and communications technology, has brought undoubted benefits for mankind. . . At the same time, its limitations and dangers cannot be overlooked, since it often contributes to polarisation, a narrowing of intellectual perspectives, a simplification of reality.”
The Vatican maintains full diplomatic relations with all but a dozen of the world’s 193 countries, and participates in 40 international organisations, including the United Nations and its agencies; the Council of Europe; the African Union; and the Organization of American States.
Although declining in Europe by about half a million annually, the RC Church is growing globally, and currently has 1.389 billion members worldwide — 17.7 per cent of the world’s population, according to its latest 2400-page Annuario Pontificio (Pontifical Year Book).
With 5353 bishops and 407,730 priests, it remains the world’s largest education and health-care provider, operating 1358 universities and more than 227,000 schools and kindergartens, as well as 102,000 hospitals, health-care and counselling centres.
In his address, the Pope welcomed the renewal of the Vatican’s 2018 accord with China on the appointment of bishops, saying that he had tried to “meet and engage in dialogue with different peoples, cultures, and religious traditions” during visits to Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Timor-Leste, and Singapore, as well as to Belgium, France, and Luxembourg.
He was saddened, however, that 2025 had begun with “heinous acts of terror” in Germany and the United States, as well as with continuing conflicts from Syria and Lebanon to Sudan and Mozambique, Myanmar, Haiti, Bolivia, Colombia, Nicaragua and Venezuela.
He also condemned “growing expressions of anti-Semitism” and anti-Christian persecution, which, he said, was also occurring in “more discreet forms” inside Europe.
“The multilateral institutions, most of which came into being at the end of World War II, no longer seem capable of ensuring peace and stability, or of carrying on the fight against hunger and promoting the development for which they were created. Nor do they seem able to respond in a truly effective way to the new challenges of this 21st century, such as environmental, public health, cultural and social issues,” he told diplomats.
“Many are in need of reform, bearing in mind that any such reform needs to be based on the principles of subsidiarity and solidarity, and respect for the equal sovereignty of states. Regrettably, the risk exists of a ‘monadology’: a fragmentation into like-minded clubs that only let in those who think in the same way.”
The Pope returned to several themes from his keynote messages during 2024, including artificial intelligence (AI), on which he had addressed G7 leaders in Italy last June (News, 21 June).
The growth of AI, he said, raised broader concerns about intellectual property rights, job security, and privacy protection, as well as about alignment of technological advances with commercial interests that threatened social mores and values.
It also highlighted the need for media literacy and critical thinking skills among young people, he said, and for a “common language” to guard against “cancel culture” and the ideological misuse of multilateral treaties and documents to further “carefully planned agendas”.
The Pope repeated previous calls for a global fund to combat hunger, using money from military expenditure, and for a two-states solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and an end to the sacrificing of “inviolable human rights” to “military needs” in Ukraine, Gaza, and other areas of “aggression and bloodshed”.
“The entire international community seems to agree on the need to respect international humanitarian law. . . If we have forgotten what lies at the very foundation of our existence, the sacredness of life, the principles that move the world, how can we think this right is effectively respected?” he asked.
“We cannot in any way accept the bombing of civilians or the attacking of infrastructures necessary for their survival. We cannot accept that children are freezing to death because hospitals have been destroyed or a country’s energy network has been hit.”
The Pope called for a final end to slavery in its “many forms”, including inhuman working conditions, drug addiction, human trafficking, and the displacement of migrants. He also called for abolition of the death penalty, release of prisoners, greater climate action, and the cancellaton of the debts of the poorest nations.
“The diplomacy of hope is, in the end, a diplomacy of justice, without which there can be no peace,” he told diplomats.
“It is also a diplomacy of forgiveness, capable, at a time full of open or latent conflicts, of mending relationships torn by hatred and violence, and thus caring for the broken hearts of their all too numerous victims.”