Pope Benedict XVI Denounces Commodities Speculation, Demands Global Response

(AP) VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI denounced speculation in commodities markets Friday and demanded a global response to high food prices based on solidarity, not profit.

Benedict told delegates of the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization that access to food is a basic human right that must be guaranteed. He said it's urgent to develop economic models that aren't just based on profit but take into account the "human dimension."

"How can we remain silent when even food has become the object of speculation or is linked to a market that, without any regulation and deprived of moral principles, appears linked solely to an objective of profit?" he asked.

High food prices, he said, require an international response by countries and institutions like the FAO to uphold the dignity of all people.

Benedict's call echoed the argument laid out in his last encyclical "Charity in Truth," which denounced the profit-at-all cost mentality blamed for the global economic downturn.

Members of the FAO who attended the audience earlier recently elected a new director-general, Jose Graziano da Silva of Brazil, who takes over at a time when FAO's mission to eradicate world hunger has been challenged by near-record high food prices.

Comments

[Paul Robertson]

08:13 AM on 07/06/2011

Food might be cheaper if there weren't so many people needing to be fed. We could, oh I don't know, all use condoms. That might help...

[Tanrioldu]

07:38 PM on 07/05/2011

Yo pope! How about you demand prosecution for the child Molestors you insist on protecting?

[TruelyFedUp]

12:02 PM on 07/05/2011

"Putting all this together, you can see that there is a lot more to who actually controls the wealth of the world and the actions they dictate from time to time that affect whether we will have a job, a home and food to eat.

At the very least we can blame the US Federal Reserve in part -also realizing that this organization remains essentially a set of private trusts holding the US public and the world to ransom with its decisions. Indeed, it is an institution heavily influenced by its Catholic masters.

Yes, collectively we all borrowed too much money. In reality all we did was ask for a little of the massive wealth stolen and held by others such as the Vatican and the Jesuits to flow through their banks and into our pockets. We weren't really borrowing, just finding a way to get back some of what is rightfully ours in the first place.

The sub prime crisis should never have happened. The Federal reserve could of easily contained the problem and stopped it in 2008. Instead, against all logic they let it get substantially worse.

[ ] Why throw the world back into a depression again after 70 years requires a fresh article-an article that explains the structure of the global banking system controlled by the Vatican and Jesuits and how they started to "turn off the credit taps" by Christmas time 2008." http://one-evil.org/acts_global_depression/acts_global_depression.htm

[arabia]

01:07 PM on 07/05/2011

TruelyFedUp,

The problem wth your source "evil.org" is that it provides no references, no notes in the publication directing the reader to another source of information to validate the assertions in your article. Today, scholars need sources and financial experts, learned journals from top schools to back up such general assertions. You supply none. An assertion we make doesn't make it true without credible or even plausible references and scholars, financial sources to back it up. You have some work to do!

[TruelyFedUp]

05:13 PM on 07/05/2011

Well, point well taken. So I sent them an email to this address and with this text; [e-mail] I'm sure we will hear back soon with full details which I will post for you....

Dear Sir,

In the interest of proving to challengers your integrity and openness about the true wealth of Vatican City and the Roman Catholic Church I would like to request your full statement of assets. I would also like permission to either publish this publicly or that you will provide me a link to which I can refer people who challenge me on these matters.

Thank you.

Sincerely,

[TruelyFedUp]

05:38 PM on 07/05/2011

Oops, though that email address is posted on the website for the Catholic Church it came back to me as defunct. I searched the Vatican website for contact info or for infomation on church assets or for a finance officer or an officer of church records all to no result.

Perhaps you could search to better results. Here is the link http://gsearch.vatican.va/search?access=p&output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&client=default_frontend&proxystylesheet=default_frontend&proxycustom=

[TruelyFedUp]

05:43 PM on 07/05/2011

Here is some fluff about it from the web http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=54617

[TruelyFedUp]

11:56 AM on 07/05/2011

"Of the top 20 banks of the world today, over half originate from the period 1760 to 1860 which saw the Jesuits disperse the massive wealth of the Catholic Church to all parts of the globe, especially great influxes into the United States.

In terms of Private Banks, in 1986, the total asset value held was said to be US$4,300 Billion. In 1997, the figure has more than doubled to $10,000 Billion. In year 2000 alone, the figure hit $13,600 Billion trillion, and is currently still growing at a rate of 30 percent per year. The current estimate of total asset value of deposits held by private banks is around $17,000 Billion. [ ]

Indirectly, the most valuable banking investment of the Roman Catholic Church is its investment control of the Federal Reserve Banks of the United States.

Through a highly complex arrangement of small holdings across sometimes thousands of banks and cross-ownership holdings hiding foreign ownership, the Catholic Church has effectively controlled the Federal Reserve Bank and therefore the destiny of the United States economy since the turn of the 20th Century." http://one-evil.org/acts_global_depression/acts_global_depression.htm

[TruelyFedUp]

11:52 AM on 07/05/2011

" While the total global value of visible property holdings of the Catholic Church are around US $316 Billion, the Vatican has developed an ingenious strategy over the past forty years to change the public mind set on the extent of its wealth. [ ]

"For most of the past 1,000 years, the Catholic Church has been in a dominant position to control the world market of gold with over 50% of all gold and a high point from around the 14th Century to around 17th Century of controlling over 60% of the total gold ever mined. [ ]

As the largest and dominant holder of capital assets (precious metals, land through Papal Bulls and slaves/serfs) for over 1,600 years the history of the Roman Catholic Church in allowing its capital reserves to be utilized in financing economic growth is in itself the history of banking and global finance."

[Social Construct]

04:48 AM on 07/05/2011

I do not care whether I agree with, follow or believe in the Pope or his faith. His stance on this issue is an absolute truth for each and every human being on the planet.

[garl26]

10:33 PM on 07/04/2011

The alleviation of poverty was not a goal of structural adjustment loans of World Bank. and the circumstances of the poor often worsened, due to a reduction in social spending and an increase in the price of food, as subsidies were lifted
Wikipedia

[ThinkCreeps]

04:20 PM on 07/04/2011

Ratzinger should watch his back - a global investigation of speculative snake-oil salesmen might end up coming straight round to his place and be expecting some serious answers.

[arabia]

06:15 PM on 07/04/2011

"...expecting some serious answers."

But a snake-oil salesman (or any kind of salesperson of oil, cosmetics, clothing) is not committed to any single theological agenda, Gospel, etc. The terrain of the pope's local atlas is also far more global than that of a salesman.

[ThinkCreeps]

07:26 PM on 07/04/2011

I guess I'm being a bit tough on snake-oil sellers. At least their buyers walk away with some snake oil.

[jsaiditfirst]

03:12 PM on 07/04/2011

He might reign as high preist over the world empire of pedifillia, and I'm not Catholic and hold no regard for the man, but for once, at least, he has espounded on an issue thats of importants to the world in general, starvation by profits.

[arabia]

06:19 PM on 07/04/2011

"...starvation by profits."

Irish Catholics experienced "starvation by profits" during the potato famine. Jonathan Swift wrote about it is his famous satire, "A Modest Proposal." We need another "Modest Proposal" to wake up the Western world.

[HdTinkler]

02:31 PM on 07/04/2011

We already know what the Pope and his Minions (Priests) like to eat.......its no longer free !

[Matt12]

12:59 PM on 07/04/2011

His Holiness is right: It's all about the speculators

[ThinkCreeps]

04:21 PM on 07/04/2011

The speculators are right; it's always all about ratzinger.

[firstamendment3]

10:28 AM on 07/04/2011

It must be expensive to feed all those little boys hidden away in the Vatican...

[James Mangan]

04:52 PM on 07/04/2011

Give me a break. Lame, pathetic, innacurate, slanderous joke, fistamendment3.

[firstamendment3]

05:28 PM on 07/04/2011

Who's joking?

[ThinkCreeps]

08:47 AM on 07/04/2011

Ratzinger's new found internet skills came up short when he claims his finger slipped, and he accidentally offered two years of world oil production at $17 a barrel.

[NevaforLeadership]

06:37 AM on 07/04/2011

Perhaps this pope should start thinking about rising food prices as demand increases with every single new birth while the church refuses to sanction birth control.

[downunder237]

07:07 PM on 07/04/2011

You know as well as I that birth control as an issue has a minimum effect on population.

People live longer.

[Paul Robertson]

08:19 AM on 07/06/2011

In first world countries where people ignore the rules against contraception, perhaps. But in the countries the pope is talking about, the ones where food is in short supply... I don't think they're plagued by long life expectancies.

[Asmodean1]

11:08 PM on 07/03/2011

His holiness the Pope does understand the "bottom line" concept. He also should understand profit and loss statements. The people growing the food, the people selling it are not a "christian" organization. Why should he hold them to the standard of the catholic churches selfless giving of all it has.

[SouthStJo]

12:50 AM on 07/04/2011

"tandard of the catholic churches selfless giving of all it has. "

LOL

[downunder237]

08:39 PM on 07/04/2011

Because many of those people within those corporations are members of the RCC.

But haven't you heard, in the good ole U.S.A. corprations are now essentially people now.
Maybe the Holy Father is trying evangelization.
(Yes, that is joke--a bad one--not meant to be taken literally).