MULTILATERALISM is threatened by “nationalism and protective isolation”, the Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Vincent Nichols, has said.
He was delivering a homily within the Methodist Central Hall, in London, on Saturday morning, at a service of thanksgiving on the eightieth anniversary of the inaugural meeting of the United Nations. A conference to mark the anniversary took place within the Hall within the afternoon.
Cardinal Nichols, who retires next month (News, 2 January), said: “It is an awesome privilege to face before you today on this hall, where, exactly 80 years ago, the seeds of a fresh global framework were sown. On 10 January 1946, because the echoes of the Second World War still reverberated across a shattered continent, representatives from 51 nations gathered here, not as victors and vanquished, but as wayfarers on a shared path towards peace.
“They got here to shape the United Nations, an audacious dream born of necessity: that humanity, scarred by unimaginable loss, could select co-operation over conflict and dialogue over destruction.”
While the UN’s vision endured today, he said, “we cannot draw back from honest reckoning.” Multilateralism faced “fierce headwinds”, as “conflicts rage from Ukraine, across parts of Africa, within the Middle East; climate accords are stalled; and the digital age fractures our shared truths into echo chambers of division.”
He continued: “We hear proclamations of peace, yet see aggression used as its means. But such proclamations are just for a peace that suits the aggressor. The very idea of countries working with trust, purpose, accountability, and patience feels, at times, like a whisper against the clamour of nationalism and protective isolation. This we see also within the plight of refugees turned away at borders and within the erosion of trust that after certain us together.”
The Christian faith offered “a timeless compass” within the efforts to “rekindle the spirit that after found expression on this hall”, Cardinal Nichols argued. “St Paul puts before us the behaviour that is required: mutual respect and repair, hospitality to the stranger, patience, empathy, freedom from revenge, the pursuit of the noble and the great.”
The UN secretary-general, António Guterres, also addressed the service. For eight many years, he said, the UN General Assembly had been “the place [where] the world comes together to assist advance peace, promote sustainable development, and safeguard human rights”.
Yet today, the multilateral system was “under threat”, he said. Last 12 months had been a “profoundly difficult” one for international co-operation and the values of the UN, as “aid was slashed, inequalities widened, climate chaos accelerated, international law was trampled, crackdowns on civil society intensified . . . and United Nations staff were repeatedly threatened — or killed — in the road of duty.
“In this moment, when the values of multilateralism are being chipped away, it’s as much as us . . . to take a stand. More than ever, the world needs civil-society movements which might be fearless and protracted — that make it unimaginable for leaders to look away.”
