Civilisation of love as the answer to the moral crisis according to St. John Paul II

Abstract

At present, a struggle is taking place for the shape of a world in which the civilisation of love is undermined by the culture of death. One of the most courageous and effective witnesses of the civilisation of love was Saint John Paul II, who repeatedly addressed this issue in his documents and speeches. The Polish Pope not only made a thorough diagnosis of the ills of the contemporary world, but also showed the way out of a dramatic situation of man being lost in the world. The "civilisation of love", which he treated as an alternative to the moral crisis, was also referred to as humanisation, culture or real development. John Paul II appeals to everyone to follow the Good News of salvation in everyday life. He encourages the world to rely on love as a primary value, but also to hold on to "justice, truth, freedom, solidarity, peace - which in Christ find a complete fulfillment". He urges the contemporary man to follow the principles of the civilisation of love, that is the primacy of the person before the thing, the priority of ethics before technology, the principle of "being" more than "having" and the priority of mercy before justice.