Pope meets founder of Latin America study center

By Devin Watkins

Pope Francis on Friday received in audience the founder of the Study Centre for Development in Latin America (CEDAL), Henryane de Chaponay.

In his words of greeting to her, the Holy Father paid tribute to her work "in the service of peace, the defense of human rights, the protection of our earth, and support for the growth of a more human and fraternal society."

Tireless creativity

He said Ms. de Chaponay’s “tireless creativity” has borne fruit in the form of meetings called “Dialogues in Humanity”.

These encounters seek to refocus politics on humanity and to construct a citizenship that cares for the “common home”.

“It is good to inspire an art of living together in simplicity, benevolence, and fraternity, as well as to educate in the culture of respect and encounter, which is capable of building a future that rises up to the ideal of humanity,” the Pope said.

Finally, Pope Francis expressed his hope that “human history may become a flowering of liberation, growth, salvation, and love”.

This, he said, is the goal of his encyclical Laudato si’, as well as the next Synod of Bishops in the Amazonia.