«We can’t let the different countries and international locations where the fate of peoples and families is decided act without the specific contribution of the legal thought of Catholic and humanist inspiration. We all know how the legislative processes are in fact affected by ideological prejudices and lobbies that support partisan interests. It’s urgent to raise the cultural level of the debate in the sphere of family law». With these words, the President of the Dicastery, Msgr. Vincenzo Paglia at the Press Conference concluded his presentation of the sense of the Work-Congress that will assemble nearly 200 jurists from around the world (from Thursday September 19th to Saturday the 21st) on “The Rights of the Family and the Challenges of the Contemporary World” at the Pontifical Urbaniana University. This event is a part of initiatives on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the “Charter of the Rights of the Family”. which has been reprinted in five languages (Italian, English, Spanish, French and Portuguese) with the Libreria Editrice Vaticana, and was edited by the Pontifical Council for the Family.

 

The President recalled that the Charter was commissioned and entrusted to the Pontifical Council for the Family by the Synod of Bishops and that the redaction required three years of work. «The intention was not merely to repeat doctrine, but much more to develop, through juridical reflection as well, an organic system of rights of the family, conceived as an independent legal entity».
 

In affirming the «family’s legal subjectivity», wrote Blessed John Paul II in his “Letter to the Families” (17): «The family is not only the sum of the people who build it, but also a community of people; it is the human ‘we’ modeled after the divine “We”». And therefore, «the family must be brought into the heart of legal thought». Indeed, «that is the great responsibility that rests on the shoulders of Catholic jurists».
 

Unfortunately—Msgr. Paglia commented—«over the past thirty years, the Charter remained a little-known document», although it contains in an organic synthesis «principles that also appear in other texts of the Church and still retain all their relevance», and «it translates into formulas expressed in technical-legal terms the duty intrinsic to the divine plan of the family».