Angelus News | May 17, 2024 | Vol. 9 No. 10

NEW WORLD OF FAITH
ARCHBISHOP JOSÉ H. GOMEZ
The promise of ‘Infinite Dignity’
I
have been reading and reflecting
on Dignitas Infinita (“Infinite Dignity”),
the declaration on human
dignity published last month by the
Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine
of the Faith.
It is an important restatement of
the Catholic vision for the human
person, and it comes at a time when
there is widespread confusion about
where human dignity and rights
come from, and even what it means
to be human.
It’s telling that this new document
is dated April 2, which is the anniversary
of the death of the great St. Pope
John Paul II.
Throughout his long pontificate,
John Paul reminded us that our societies
in the West are founded on the
Jewish and Christian understanding
of the human person.
He would often quote those stirring
words of the Second Vatican Council:
“Christ the Lord … fully reveals
man to man himself and makes his
supreme calling clear.”
From the Jewish people, we inherit
the revelation that all creation is
God’s handiwork, that the human
being is created in God’s image, with
a body and a soul, and called to walk
with God, forming families and being
fruitful, caring for creation and loving
goodness and doing justice.
In the story of the Jewish people’s
exodus out of Egypt, God reveals
that his name is mercy, that he hears
the cry of the poor, and that he has
created the human person to worship
him in freedom.
In Jesus Christ, this God enters into
human history and takes on human
flesh, sharing in our humanity in
order to show us both the human
face of God and the true “face” of our
humanity.
In Jesus we come to understand that
we are more than mere creatures.
We are God’s children, his sons and
daughters, and he loves each of us so
much that his Son was willing to give
his own life to save us from sin and
death.
What runs like a bright line through
our biblical inheritance is the greatness
to the human person in God’s
plan for creation. As one of the saints
said, “The glory of God is the human
being fully alive!”
All of the great achievements of the
West — in science and technology, in
medicine, in the arts and architecture;
all our beliefs about charity, empathy,
compassion, and social justice
— are the fruits of the Incarnation
and the glorious truth it reveals about
human nature and human destiny.
We can forget that before the appearance
of Jews and Christians, the
world had never heard the good news
of God’s love, or the truth that human
life is sacred and endowed by the
Creator with dignity and rights.
Values and concepts that we take for
granted are all rooted in this vision
that we have inherited from the
Bible — our belief that people have
the right to food, shelter, health care,
and work; to be free from violence
and coercion; our presumptions that
human beings are born equal, that
society has the duty to care for the
weak and vulnerable.
As our societies become more secularized,
and more guided by a materialist
and technocratic understanding
of the world, we risk forgetting God
and the true meaning of human life.
Dignitas Infinita identifies many
“grave violations” of human dignity
already growing in the world today:
abortion, euthanasia, the death
penalty; poverty and war; the plight of
migrants; human trafficking; violence
against women, discrimination
against the disabled; the practice of
surrogate motherhood and gender
theory; “new forms of violence …
spreading through social media.”
In confronting these challenges,
the Church must continue to defend
every human life as sacred, regardless
of its condition, from conception to
natural death.
We need to insist that human dignity
and rights are transcendent, that
they come from God and not from
governments.
Only this truth guarantees the
greatness and freedom of the human
person. Only this truth guarantees
that our rights do not become arbitrary,
something to be granted or taken
away at the whim of those in power.
It’s also important that we hand
on to our young people the sense of
excitement and joy that comes with
knowing that our lives are a beautiful
gift from our Creator.
We are called to a friendship with
Jesus that gives our lives their true
purpose and direction: following in
his footsteps, being transformed in his
likeness through the Eucharist and
the sacraments, striving together as
brothers and sisters to reach our destination,
which is communion with
God in love for all eternity.
This is the promise of our infinite
dignity. We should rejoice in this every
day and share our joy with others.
Pray for me and I will pray for you.
And let us ask our Blessed Mother
Mary to bring a new awareness that
we are all children of God, made
with infinite dignity and bound for
glory.
May 17, 2024 • ANGELUS • 3