Pope Benedict XVI Encourages International Literacy Day
(September 12, 2009) Pope Benedict XVI has given his support to U.N. efforts to promote
literacy, noting that along with hunger, poverty and disease, illiteracy is one of
the major obstacles to development. The Pope affirmed this in a note sent through
his secretary of state, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, to the director-general of UNESCO,
Koichiro Matsuura, on the occasion of International Literacy Day, celebrated September
8. The statement expresses the Holy Father's "encouragement for all people who work
for literacy with UNESCO," since, "like hunger, poverty and endemic disease, illiteracy
is one of the major obstacles to development." The Pontiff called literacy "one of
the most important springboards for the integral development of the person, making
them more capable of self-orientation and able to participate more actively in public
life." As he mentioned in his encyclical "Caritas in Veritate," Pope Benedict XVI
expressed his wish that literacy can help bring about an evolution toward "better
instructed and more solid societies," consolidating a "democratic life capable of
ensuring peace and freedom". The papal message concluded with the promise of a special
blessing for UNESCO collaborators. According to UNESCO, one in five adults is still
not literate and two-thirds of them are women.