The Engagement of the U.S. Bishops in Moral Questions Regarding Nuclear Weapons

Floor Speech

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Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I recently hosted a briefing entitled Catholic Engagement on Nuclear Disarmament: What are the moral questions? and one of the speakers, His Excellency Archbishop Bernardito Auza, Permanent Representative of the Holy See to the United Nations, presented the following statement:
The Holy See has always been morally against nuclear weapons and has always called for their abolition. It has worked and continues to work for a world without nuclear weapons.

In February 1943, two years and a half before the Trinity test, Pope Pius XII had already voiced deep concern regarding the violent use of atomic energy. In an address to a meeting of Western military scientists in 1953, Pope Pius XII said that the possession of ``ABC'' (Atomic-Biological-Chemical) weapons made legitimate self-defense against an aggressor a less likely prospect, because ``if the damage resulting from war is not comparable with that of the `injustice tolerated,' one may be obliged `to submit to the injustice.' '' Devoting his entire 1954 Easter Message to the question of nuclear weapons, he spoke of the effects of a nuclear war by evoking ``the vision of vast territories rendered uninhabitable and useless to mankind ..... transmissible diseases ..... and monstrous deformities.'' Given such totally uncontrollable and indiscriminate consequences, the Pope demanded ``the effective proscription and banishment of atomic warfare,'' calling the arms race a ``costly relationship of mutual terror.'' This was the first clear papal condemnation of the nuclear arms race, sixteen years before the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT).

Already well within the Cold War era and right after the Cuban missile crisis, Pope Saint John XXIII, in his 1963 Encyclical Pacem in Terris, called for the abolition of nuclear weapons and for the establishment of an adequate disarmament program to achieve that end. He spoke very clearly about the theory or doctrine of deterrence as the principal cause of the arms race and of arms proliferation and about the tremendous economic burdens the arms race provoked. He argued quite extensively that ``justice, right reason, and the recognition of man's dignity cry out insistently for a cessation to the arms race. The stockpiles of armaments that have been built up in various countries must be reduced reciprocally and simultaneously by the parties concerned. Nuclear weapons must be banned. A general agreement must be reached on a suitable disarmament program, with an effective system of mutual control. Unless this process of disarmament be thoroughgoing and complete, and reaches men's very souls, it is impossible to stop the arms race, or to reduce armaments, or--and this is the main thing--ultimately to abolish them entirely. Everyone must sincerely co-operate in the effort to banish fear and the anxious expectation of war from men's minds. But this requires that the fundamental principles upon which peace is based in today's world be replaced by an altogether different one, namely, the realization that true and lasting peace among nations cannot consist in the possession of an equal supply of armaments but only in mutual trust. And we are confident that this can be achieved, for it is a thing that not only is dictated by common sense, but is in itself most desirable and most fruitful of good.''

In his address to the UN General Assembly on 4 October 1965, Pope Paul VI characterized nuclear weapons as ``nightmares'' and ``dark designs.'' He also stressed that the weapons themselves ``lead astray the mentality of peoples.'' His plea of ``jamais plus la guerre,'' of ``war never again,'' reverberated in the General Assembly Hall. But his appeal to let weapons fall from our hands, ``especially the terrible weapons that modern science has given us,'' in clear reference to nuclear arms, still remains unheeded. Pope Paul's call to end the nuclear arms race reached its culmination in his 1977 World Day of Peace message, in which he demonstrated that nuclear arms offered a false sense of security. He reiterated this in his message to the U.N. General Assembly on Disarmament in 1978, calling the peace of nuclear deterrence ``a tragic illusion.'' He also reiterated an assertion made earlier in his papacy, that the nuclear arms race retarded the development of peoples, citing the ``crying disproportion between the resources in money and intelligence devoted to the service of death and the resources devoted to the service of life.''

In 1982, Pope Saint John Paul II addressed a message to the United Nations General Assembly on its second conference devoted to Disarmament. The Pope said that in the ``current conditions of the Cold War, `deterrence,' considered not as an end in itself but as a step toward a progressive disarmament, may still be judged morally acceptable. Nonetheless, in order to ensure peace, it is indispensable not to be satisfied with this minimum, which is always susceptible to the real danger of explosion.'' The Holy Father, therefore, did not countenance deterrence as a permanent measure.

As time progressed and the central promise of the NPT remained unfulfilled, the Holy See stepped up its efforts to argue for the abolition of nuclear weapons. In his 2006 World Day of Peace Message, Pope Benedict XVI criticized the argument of nuclear arms for security as ``completely fallacious'' and affirmed that ``peace requires that all strive for progressive and concerted nuclear disarmament.''

Since the 2010 Review Conference of the Parties to the NPT, there has been an increased attention to the humanitarian dimension of and the risks associated with nuclear weapons. This heightened interest was manifested by cross-regional humanitarian statements in the UN and other regional and international fora and, in particular, by the organization of three Conferences on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons in Oslo (March 2013), Nayarit (February 2014), and Vienna (December 2014). These Conferences have seen increased participation of States, of non-governmental organizations and of the greater civil society.

During the Vienna Conference, the Holy See presented three documents: first, the official Statement delivered by the Delegation of the Holy See; second, the message that Pope Francis sent to His Excellency Mr. Sebastian Kurz, President of the Vienna Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons in December 2014; and, third, a paper entitled ``Nuclear Disarmament: Time for Abolition.''

On April 9, 2015, the Permanent Observer Mission of the Holy See to the United Nations in New York organized a conference entitled ``Nuclear Weapons and the Moral Compass.'' The Speakers were neither nuclear scientists nor political authorities, but rather religious leaders: an Anglican Bishop, a Rabbi, an Evangelical Minister, an Imam, and a Catholic Bishop in the person of Bishop Oscar Cantú, Bishop of Las Cruces and Chairman of the USCCB Committee on International Justice and Peace.

The objective of the Conference was to insist on and strengthen the moral argument against not only the use but also the possession of nuclear weapons. Arguing against the policy of deterrence, the Conference served to echo and further disseminate the Paper that the Holy See presented in Vienna and Pope Francis's strong stand for the abolition of nuclear weapons The timing of the Conference was in anticipation of the then imminent Ninth Review Conference on the Treaty on the Non Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, which opened yesterday at the UN in New York and will continue until May 22.

The NPT is one of the best known and most adhered to Treaties, with Palestine being the 191st Party to it. The Holy See has been a Party to the NPT since the very beginning, not because it has nuclear weapons or has to be constrained from developing nuclear weapons capabilities, but to encourage nuclear possessing States to abolish their nuclear weapons, to dissuade non-nuclear possessing States from acquiring or developing nuclear capabilities, and to encourage international cooperation on the peaceful uses of nuclear energy.

The documents that the Holy See presented in Vienna advanced anew the moral argument against both the possession and the use of nuclear weapons, and aimed to sustain and advance the discussion along this line.

The Holy See considers it a moral and humanitarian imperative to advance the efforts towards the final objective of the total elimination of nuclear weapons. It argues that disarmament treaties are not just legal obligations; they are also moral commitments based on trust between States, rooted in the trust that citizens place in their governments. If commitments to nuclear disarmament are not made in good faith and consequently result in breaches of trust, the proliferation of such weapons would be the logical corollary.

Despite some progress and much effort on the part of many, nuclear disarmament is currently in crisis. The institutions that are

supposed to move this process forward have been blocked for years. The central promise of the NPT has remained a dream. In fact, while the pre-NPT nuclear power countries not only have not disarmed but are also modernizing their nuclear arsenals, some pre-NPT non-nuclear countries have acquired or are in the process of acquiring nuclear arms capabilities. What is even more terrifying is the possibility that non-state actors, like terrorist and extremist organizations, could acquire nuclear weapons.
The possession of nuclear weapons and the reliance on nuclear deterrence have had a very negative impact on relations between and among States. National security often comes up in discussions on nuclear weapons. All States have the right to national security, but this principle must not be applied in a partial and discriminatory manner, for example, when one State affirms that it needs nuclear weapons for its national security, while at the same time affirming that another State cannot have them. It is urgent to revisit in a transparent and honest manner the definition made by States, especially the nuclear weapons states, of their national security.

Nuclear weapons cannot create for us a stable and secure world. Peace and international stability cannot be founded on mutually-assured destruction or on the threat of total destruction. The Holy See believes that peace cannot be reduced solely to maintaining a balance of power between enemies. On the contrary, as Pope Francis affirms in his letter to the President of the Vienna Conference, ``Peace must be built on justice, socio-economic development, freedom, respect for human rights, the participation of all in public affairs and the building of trust between peoples.''

In its argument against the possession and use of nuclear weapons, the Holy See also focuses attention on (1) the costs of the nuclear stalemate to the global common good; (2) the ``illusions of security'' inherent in the possession of nuclear arms; (3) the inequality at the root of the non-proliferation regime according to the NPT; and (4) the enormous toll that current nuclear policies take on the poor and on the world's priorities.

The United Nations will soon adopt the Post-2015 Sustainable Development Agenda. The Sustainable Development Goals contained therein are daunting and require enormous means to implement. It would be nai 4ve and myopic if we seek to assure world peace and security through nuclear weapons rather than through the eradication of extreme poverty, making healthcare and education accessible to all, and promoting peaceful institutions and societies through dialogue and solidarity.

For our own good and that of future generations, we have no reasonable and moral option other than the abolition of nuclear weapons. Nuclear weapons are a global problem and they impact all countries and all peoples, including future generations. Moreover, ever-growing interdependence and globalization demand that whatever response we may have against the threat of nuclear weapons must be collective and concerted, based on reciprocal trust.

Arguing for nuclear abolition from the moral perspective, the Holy See appeals to human consciences. As Paul VI affirmed in his 1965 Address to the United Nations General Assembly, ``Today, as never before, in an era marked by such human progress, there is need for an appeal to the moral conscience of man. For the danger comes, not from progress, nor from science. The real danger comes from man himself, who has at his disposal ever more powerful instruments, which can be used for destruction as for the loftiest conquests.''

No one could ever say that a world without nuclear weapons is easily achievable. It is not; it is extremely arduous; it is even a utopia for some. But there is no alternative than to work unceasingly towards its achievement. As President John F. Kennedy said in his Commencement Address at the American University on 10 June 1963, ``The pursuit of peace is not as dramatic as the pursuit of war--and frequently the words of the pursuers fall on deaf ears. But we have no more urgent task.''

Let me conclude by reaffirming the conviction that Pope Francis expressed in his December 2014 message to the President of the Vienna Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons: ``I am convinced that the desire for peace and fraternity planted deep in the human heart will bear fruit in concrete ways to ensure that nuclear weapons are banned once and for all, to the benefit of our common home.''

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