CCBI President's Independence Day Message - 2007
Oswald Gracias: India Stands Erect Among Nations with Great Moral Authority
Bangalore, 15 August, 2007 (CCBI News):Message of Oswald Gracias as India Celebrates Its Diamond Jubilee of Independence
August 15, 2007 takes our minds back to August 15, 1947 when at the stroke of midnight India awoke to a new dawn and the world welcomed into its ranks another great free nation: our beloved motherland India.
Pride swells our hearts when we think about the great men and women who have walked our land and led it to great heights. Economic progress has been evidenced in the past few years but the soul of India was being nourished by its great leaders right from the beginning so that it stood erect with great moral authority among the Comity of Nations.
Today, the world looks with awe at India because of its great economic strides as it foresees that within a decade it will be among the leading economic forces of the world. At the same time we have to regretfully admit that the benefits of economic progress have not percolated to all levels of society. There are still millions in our country who are living below the poverty line; millions who cannot read or write; millions who are still deprived of adequate medical facilities; thousands of villages still remain without adequate water, sufficient power or proper sanitation. Only when no Indian is hungry when every Indian can live with dignity and has an opportunity to contribute to our nation's progress can we say that we have truly arrived.
On this happy occasion, we pray to God to bless our Motherland, its leaders and its people, a land so richly blessed with resources, human and material. We pray to God that the years ahead will see besides economic progress, development in every field particularly moral values so that corruption, intolerance and criminality become buried in history. We pray to God that our country become to the world a model of true humanism, genuine respect for the individual and deep upholding of spiritual values. JAI BHARAT MATA, JAI HIND".
+Oswald Gracias
Archbishop of Bombay and President - C.C.B.I.
Pride swells our hearts when we think about the great men and women who have walked our land and led it to great heights. Economic progress has been evidenced in the past few years but the soul of India was being nourished by its great leaders right from the beginning so that it stood erect with great moral authority among the Comity of Nations.
Today, the world looks with awe at India because of its great economic strides as it foresees that within a decade it will be among the leading economic forces of the world. At the same time we have to regretfully admit that the benefits of economic progress have not percolated to all levels of society. There are still millions in our country who are living below the poverty line; millions who cannot read or write; millions who are still deprived of adequate medical facilities; thousands of villages still remain without adequate water, sufficient power or proper sanitation. Only when no Indian is hungry when every Indian can live with dignity and has an opportunity to contribute to our nation's progress can we say that we have truly arrived.
On this happy occasion, we pray to God to bless our Motherland, its leaders and its people, a land so richly blessed with resources, human and material. We pray to God that the years ahead will see besides economic progress, development in every field particularly moral values so that corruption, intolerance and criminality become buried in history. We pray to God that our country become to the world a model of true humanism, genuine respect for the individual and deep upholding of spiritual values. JAI BHARAT MATA, JAI HIND".
+Oswald Gracias
Archbishop of Bombay and President - C.C.B.I.
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