（2018.7.27 バチカン放送）教皇フランシスコは、26日から29日までボスニア・ヘルツェゴビナの首都サラエボで開かれている「世界教会におけるカトリック倫理神学」（ CTEWC）主催の国際会議に、メッセージを送られた。
会議のテーマは「橋を架けることが困難な時代に：今日のカトリック倫理神学」で、世界的な問題になっている環境保全や、難民・移民などについて、倫理神学の視点から専門家たちが意見を交換した。
教皇は参加者に宛てたメッセージで、会議の開催地サラエボを「橋の都市」と表現。「異なる民族、文化、宗教、政治思想が交差する中で、分裂と緊張を超え、再構築へ歩むこの都市が、会議にインスピレーションを与えてくれるでしょう」と意義を強調され、「壁ではなく、橋を」という言葉を繰り返しながら、「世界から壁を取り除き、兄弟愛の橋を築くことが求められています」と強調された。
そして、環境や移民などをめぐる問題が拡大・複雑化するこの時代にあって、すべての人が運命を共にするこの世界で、「皆がより良く生きることができるよう、助け導く、リーダーシップが必要です」と述べられ、CTEWCがこれまで培ってきたネットワークを生かして、世界の様々な問題に、「倫理神学の立場から、情熱をもって対話の橋を架ける」ように求められた。
バチカン発表のメッセージ全文の英語訳は以下の通り。
（「カトリック・あい」編集）
MESSAGE OF THE HOLY FATHER FRANCESCO TO THE PARTICIPANTS IN THE III INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE OF
“CATHOLIC THEOLOGICAL ETHICS IN THE WORLD CHURCH” [Sarajevo, 26-29 July 2018]
“A Critical Time for Bridge-Building: Catholic Theological Ethics Today”
Dear brothers and sisters!
I greet you participants at the third world ethics conference. It is held in Sarajevo, a city full of symbolic value for the path of reconciliation and pacification, after the horrors of a recent war that has caused so much suffering to the people of that region.
Sarajevo is a city of bridges. Your conference too was inspired by this dominant motif, a warning to rebuild, in a climate of divisions and tensions, new paths of rapprochement between peoples, cultures, religions, visions of life, political orientations. I appreciated your effort from the beginning, during the visit to the Vatican by members of your Planning Committee , last March.
The theme of your conference moves in a perspective that I have often referred to myself: “bridges and not walls”, I am repeating in the lively hope that attention is paid to this need that we are increasingly aware of, even if at sometimes opposed by fears and regressions. Instead, without renouncing prudence, it is necessary to grasp every signal and mobilize every energy to eliminate the walls of division in the world and build bridges of fraternity.
The three focal points of the conference cross in depth this path of building bridges in a critical age, as it turns out to be ours. The ecological challenge is placed at the center of special attention, because it contains aspects that can cause serious imbalances, not only on the axis of the relationship between man and nature, but also on those of relations between generations and among the peoples. This challenge – as emerges from the Encyclical Laudato si ‘ – is not one of many, but it is the horizon of understanding of ecological ethics and at the same time of social ethics. This is why the reference you make to the issue of migrants and refugees is very serious and causes metanoia which concerns ethical-theological reflection, even before inspiring appropriate pastoral attitudes and responsible and aware political practices.
In such a demanding and complex scenario, there is a need for people and institutions to assume renewed leadership . There is no need for the noise of proclamations, which often remain in vain; there is no need for antagonism between those who play the strongest. We need leadership that helps us discover and live a more just way of being in the world as we all participate in a common destiny.
If I ask myself how the theological ethics can offer its specific contribution in this sense, I appreciate the intuition that you propose to implement: networking among people who, in the five continents, with different modalities and expressions, are dedicated to ethical reflection in theological key and strive to find new and effective resources in it. With these resources we can carry out appropriate analyzes, but above all to mobilize energies in order to a compassionate praxis and attentive to human drama to accompany it with merciful care. To weave this network, it is urgently necessary to build bridges, share paths, accelerate approaches. It is certainly not a matter of standardizing the points of view, but rather of seeking with sincere will the convergence in the intentions, in the dialogue opening and in the comparison on the perspectives. Veritatis gaudium . There I recalled the basic criteria for a renewal and a revival of ecclesiastical studies, and among these criteria I emphasized the importance of “all-encompassing dialogue” ( n.4, b ), which is at the basis of inter- and transdisciplinary openness, so vital also for theology and for theological ethics. And I also indicated “the urgent need to” network “among the various institutions that, in every part of the world, cultivate and promote ecclesiastical studies” ( No. 4, d ).
I appeal to you, lovers of theological ethics, and I encourage you to be passionate about this dialogue and networking. From the exercise of such attitudes you will draw your inspirations for penetrating analysis, attentive to the complexity of the human phenomenon. And you will always learn better the forms of fidelity to the Word of God that challenges us in history and solidarity with the world, on which you are not called to make judgments, but to indicate roads, accompany paths, soothe wounds, support fragility.
You already have a more than ten-year path in your liaison network Catholic theological ethics in the Word Church . Your world conferences in Padua (2006) and Trento (2010), as well as the regional conferences in the various continents and the various initiatives conducted so far with publications and teaching activities, have trained you in a style of sharing that I wish you carry forward fruitfully for the whole Church. I thank with you those who leave the office and those who take it, I pray for them and I cordially send my blessing, asking you also to pray for me.
