Fr. Lombardi editorial: "Suffering without a name"
The latest tragic shipwreck at sea of a large number of migrants and refugees between
Africa and Europe has quite justly aroused widespread and profound shock.
Certainly
many hundreds of unknown people have died in the Mediterranean in recent months, and
thousands in recent years, and it reminds us of the tens of thousands of Vietnamese
boat people who lost their lives in the sea in the early months of 1979. Fleeing from
famine, from terrible poverty, from oppression, from violence, from war… at the risk
of dying in the waves without a trace, not even a record of their names. On many occasions,
recently, we have spoken of suffering “without a name”. Compassion compels us not
to forget, but to remember, as we do when facing other unspeakable tragedies of humanity,
a story that belongs to us, in solidarity with the poor of the earth.
The
Jewish people understood it perfectly when they erected the Yad Vashem memorial, “the
memorial of names”. It was there that Pope Benedict XVI delivered a meditation that
came to mind recently when confronted with the death of so many innocent and unknown
victims. “They lost their lives, but they will never lose their names: these are indelibly
etched in the hearts of their loved ones, their surviving fellow prisoners, and all
those determined never to allow such an atrocity to disgrace mankind again. Most of
all, their names are forever fixed in the memory of Almighty God.” “May their suffering
never be denied, belittled or forgotten! And may all people of goodwill remain vigilant
in rooting out from the heart of man anything that could lead to tragedies such as
this!”
Eradicate the absurd hate that led to the Shoah, but also work now
to eradicate the injustice, indifference and egoism that lead too many people to vanish
beneath the waves in search of a more humane life. God remembers them, let us remember
them, too.