Safety And Peace For Children Worldwide

By TONY MAGLIANO, CNS

Published: September 18, 2003

As we celebrate the anniversaries of our successful Catholic schools here in Atlanta and dedicate our new church buildings with prayer and gratitude, perhaps we can also take some time to remember the needs of children worldwide. The work of Amigos for Christ in Nicaragua by some of our fellow Georgians is a reminder that we may be called to be “God’s hands” in unexpected ways and that we should respond with the same enthusiasm when that call comes. This issue also introduces Dr. Ann Price, our new director for the archdiocesan Office of Child and Youth Protection, who brings a renewed focus on helping us provide safe environments for our children. At the very least, we can continue to pray for peace for all of the world’s children.

—Mary Anne Castranio

The United Nations has declared 2001-2010 the “International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Nonviolence for the Children of the World.” A wonderful declaration indeed!

After all, who deserves to live in peace more than the little ones of our world? Yet they often are the very ones who suffer the most. Countless children around the globe experience every day the many forms of violence.

In Colombia, Brazil and Romania, many poor children are abandoned to the streets where they search for scraps of food by day and sleep in sewers by night.

In Thailand children are exploited by a growing tourist sex industry.

In Vietnam and China, subcontractors for some American corporations use children to work long hours, in substandard conditions, to make cheap items for Western consumers and huge profits for investors and company executives.

In Cambodia and Bosnia, children are losing life and limb from leftover land mines.

In Sierra Leone and Liberia, children as young as 10 are forced into combat.

In Sudan children are captured and sold into slavery.

And in much of sub-Saharan Africa, where economic globalization has failed to venture, thousands of children die daily from malnutrition and related diseases.

In the United States, 20 percent of all children are allowed to live in poverty. And up to 1 million exist on the streets of America as runaways and throwaways—exploited by pimps and drug dealers. Drive-by shootings, gang warfare and high rates of child abuse also plague many American children.

Maybe, just maybe, this U.N. declaration—calling for 10 years of peaceful efforts on behalf of the world’s children—will do some good. The Vatican’s nuncio to the United Nations in 2001, Archbishop Renato R. Martino, thinks it will help, but he cautions that certain global and personal attitudes must change: “A culture of peace must begin in human hearts. Violence must be put aside in every aspect of human life. A true change of heart must begin in the home and in the family, and must be founded on true respect of each and every person, and of each and every community.”

If we prayerfully work to root out anger in our hearts, in our families and in our church, and if we resolve to assist the victims of violence—especially the children—to the best of our ability, our light will rise in the darkness, and our darkest hour will be like noon (cf. Isaiah 58:10)!