Pope asks Christians to contribute to just society

Presenting the message to the press, German cardinal Paul Joseph Cordes insisted on the need to "correct" social factors.

VATICAN CITY, February 4, 2010 (AFP) - Pope Benedict XVI on Thursday urged Christians to "contribute to creating just societies" in his Lent message, which will be read in Catholic churches worldwide.

"Material goods are certainly useful and required," but Jesus himself "surely condemns the indifference that even today forces hundreds of millions into death through lack of food, water and medicine," he said.

The annual statement, issued by the Vatican in seven languages, added that "injustice, the fruit of evil, does not have exclusively external roots; its origin lies in the human heart, where the seeds are found of a mysterious cooperation with evil."

Presenting the message to the press, German cardinal Paul Joseph Cordes insisted on the need to "correct" social factors that caused injustice, saying the Catholic Church had a role to play.

"It would be false to place us Christians among the those who are opposed to a just redistribution and have continuously defended an unjust social order," said the cardinal.

Lent, which will begin this year on February 17, is as a period of prayer, repentance and self denial that culminates in the Holy Week leading up to Easter.