71. A Heart Open to the Whole World - Fratelli Tutti Chapter 4 - Belief Street

<p>“...no one people, culture or individual can achieve everything on its own: to attain fulfillment in life we need others. An awareness of our own limitations and incompleteness, far from being a threat, becomes the key to envisaging and pursuing a common project. For man is a limited being who is himself limitless.”</p> <p>Welcome to Empathy Media Lab’s Belief Street where we’ll be exploring religious concepts through text and scripture, interviews and profiles, and documentaries and films.  </p> <p>So why do I want to explore religious concepts even though I haven’t been a practicing Catholic for over two decades?</p> <p>Well, first, I’m appalled at the hypocrites who have hijacked Jesus’ teachings to love our neighbor and treat people the way we want to be treated. </p> <p>And as an outsider looking into the internal politics of the Catholic Church, it appears to me that there is civil war raging between a progressive Pope Francis and a very dangerous reactionary faction that sides with the hypocrites previously mentioned.</p> <p>Ultimately, the outcome of this battle will determine whether it is fear or love that organizes the Holy See.</p> Fratelli Tutti <p>For this series of Belief Street, I’ll be reading<a href='http://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20201003_enciclica-fratelli-tutti.html'> Fratelli Tutti</a>, which is Pope Francis’ Encyclical subtitled "on fraternity and social friendship.”</p> <p>The encyclical calls for more human fraternity and solidarity, and is a plea to reject wars.</p> <p>The document was signed on  October 3rd 2020, on the occasion of Pope Francis's visit to the tomb of his namesake, Saint Francis of Assisi, and was published the following day, on the saint's feast day.</p> <p>The Catholic Church I went to growing up in Muskegon, Michigan was called St. Francis De Sales and it is one of the strangest concrete structures I’ve ever seen. </p> <p>The Sunday experience in that brutalist architectural design made a lasting impression on me tha