Vatican calls for better treatment of gypsies

(October 3, 2008) The Vatican is urging better treatment for Gypsies, particularly the end to "special schools" for the ethnic group and the forced sterilization of their women. These are two of the exhortations found in the final document of 6th World Congress for the Pastoral Care of Gypsies. The conference was held Sept. 1-4 in Freising, Germany, but the conclusive document was released on Thursday in the Vatican by the Pontifical Council for Migrants and Itinerant Peoples, which cosponsored the event with the German bishops' conference. One hundred and fifty delegates participated in the conference, which was focused on "Gypsy Youth in the Church and Society." The document states that education is fundamental in the process of the fulfilment of personal potential and integration in society, but it is necessary to prohibit the registration of Gypsies in 'special schools,' which generates humiliation. The conference also decried "forced sterilizations and those campaigns that tend to destabilize the concept of family among the Gypsies." "Excluded, confined to the margins of humanity, humiliated,” document said,“the Gypsies need a living Church, a Church-communion, capable of forming and helping them to overcome difficulties that great policies do not manage to overcome."