Pax Christi International is an international Catholic peace movement. The Pax Christi International website declares its mission is "to transform a world shaken by violence, terrorism, deepening inequalities, and global insecurity".

History

''Pax Christi'' (Latin for Peace of Christ) was established in

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

in March 1945 by Marthe Dortel-Claudot and Bishop

Pierre-Marie Théas Pierre-Marie Théas (14 September 1894 – 3 April 1977) was a French Roman Catholic bishop of Montauban and bishop of Tarbes and Lourdes. A significant figure in Catholic resistance to Nazism in France, he was recognised as Righteous among the Na ...

, after the Germans had been expelled from France but before the end of World War II in Europe. Both were French citizens interested in reconciliation between French and German citizens in the aftermath of the war. Some of the first actions of Pax Christi were the organisation of kindness pilgrimages and other actions fostering reconciliation between France and Germany. Although Pax Christi initially began as a movement for French-German reconciliation, it expanded its focus and spread to other European countries in the 1950s. It grew as “a crusade of prayer for peace among all nations.” Pax Christi was recognized as “the official international Catholic peace movement” by Pope

Pius XII Pope Pius XII (; born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli; 2 March 18769 October 1958) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 2 March 1939 until his death on 9 October 1958. He is the most recent p ...

in 1952. It also has chapters in the United States. In the 1960s, it became involved in Mississippi in organizing economic boycotts of businesses that discriminated against blacks, in an effort to support protesters in the civil rights movement, who were trying to end discrimination in facilities and employment. It was active in

Greenwood, Mississippi Greenwood is a city in and the county seat of Leflore County, Mississippi, United States, located at the eastern edge of the Mississippi Delta region, approximately 96 miles north of the state capital, Jackson, and 130 miles south of the rive ...

, among other places. In 1983, Pax Christi International was awarded the UNESCO Peace Education Prize. The Pax Christi network membership is made up of 18 national sections and 115 Member Organizations working in over 50 countries. In 2017 a bishop has resigned from his post as chairman citing anti-Semitism, He cited in particular the verbal harassment of Jews who attended a lecture sponsored by Pax Christi.

Peace work

Pax Christi focuses on

human rights Human rights are universally recognized Morality, moral principles or Social norm, norms that establish standards of human behavior and are often protected by both Municipal law, national and international laws. These rights are considered ...

human security Human security is a paradigm for understanding global social vulnerability, vulnerabilities whose proponents challenge the traditional notion of national security through military security by arguing that the proper referent for security should be ...

disarmament Disarmament is the act of reducing, limiting, or abolishing Weapon, weapons. Disarmament generally refers to a country's military or specific type of weaponry. Disarmament is often taken to mean total elimination of weapons of mass destruction, ...

and demilitarisation
nonviolence

nuclear disarmament Nuclear disarmament is the act of reducing or eliminating nuclear weapons. Its end state can also be a nuclear-weapons-free world, in which nuclear weapons are completely eliminated. The term ''denuclearization'' is also used to describe the pro ...

extractives
in Latin America, and a renewed peace process for Israel-Palestine. Since 1988, the organisation gives out the Pax Christi International Peace Award to peace organisations and peace activists around the world.

Organization

Pax Christi is made up of national sections of the movement, affiliated organizations and partner organizations. Its International Secretariat is in

Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...

. Pax Christi has consultative status as a

non-governmental organization A non-governmental organization (NGO) is an independent, typically nonprofit organization that operates outside government control, though it may get a significant percentage of its funding from government or corporate sources. NGOs often focus ...

at the United Nations.

International presidents

Maurice Feltin Maurice Feltin (15 May 1883 – 27 September 1975) was a French Cardinal (Catholic Church), cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. He served as Archbishop of Paris from 1949 to 1966, and was elevated to the Cardinal (Catholic Church), cardinala ...

(1950–1965) * Bernard Alfrink (1965–1978) * Luigi Bettazzi (1978–1985) * Franz König (1985–1990) *

Godfried Danneels Godfried Maria Jules Danneels (4 June 1933 – 14 March 2019) was a Belgian Catholic prelate who served as Archbishop of Mechelen-Brussels and the chairman of the Episcopal Conference of Belgium from 1979 to 2010. He was elevated to the car ...

(1990–1999) *

Michel Sabbah Michel Sabbah (; born 19 March 1933) is a Catholic Church in Palestine, Palestinian Catholic prelate who served as the Latin Patriarchate of Jerusalem, Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem from 1987 to 2008, the first non-Italian to hold the position in m ...

(1999–2007) In 2007, a co-presidency was created with a bishop and a lay woman. * Laurent Monsengwo (2007–2010) *Marie Dennis (2007–2019) * Kevin Dowling ( C.SS.R.) (2010–2019) *Sr. Teresia Wamuyu Wachira, IBVM (2019–present) * Marc Stenger (2019–present)

References

External links

*
Pax Christi Peace Stories

Catholic Nonviolence Initiative
{{Authority control International Christian organizations Peace organizations Catholic lay organisations Organizations established in 1945 Anti-nuclear organizations International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons