Pope Ends Uruguay Visit With Call for Greater Social Justice

Pope John Paul II ended his 45-hour visit to Uruguay today after meeting President Julio Maria Sanguinettia, an agnostic, and later celebrating a Mass in which he called for greater social justice and improved distribution of wealth.

The Pope told an outdoor Mass for 70,000 people in the northern city of Salto that the Catholic Church was ready for a “new evangelization” that would represent “a maturity of your faith.”

“The new evangelization, spurred by the mandate of love, will spread the desired promotion of justice in its full meaning, such as the distribution of wealth and respect for human dignity,” the Pope said.

“This,” he said, “is the imperative of every Uruguayan.”

After the Mass, the pontiff prepared to fly to La Paz, Bolivia, to begin a five-day visit.

Before the pontiff’s homily in Salto, the city’s French-born bishop, the Most Rev. Marcelo Mendiharat, praised the 1985 return of democracy in Uruguay after 12 years of military rule, but denounced deteriorated social conditions.

“We continue to be worried about the growing poverty in our country, the lack of housing, insufficient salaries, defective health care and education, the bad distribution of land ownership and the emigration of our youth in search of new horizons,” he said.

When he arrived in Uruguay Saturday, the pontiff said he intended to side with those who “suffer the most.” But he withheld direct criticism of the government’s economic program, which produced 6% and 4% growth rates in 1986 and 1987, one of the best records in Latin America.