On the same day - The Pope and "Imagine" at the United Nations

Shakira Performs John Lennon’s ‘Imagine’ at the United Nations

Excerpt:

Pop superstar Shakira Mebarak performed a soulful rendition of “Imagine” at the United Nations General Assembly on Friday, the same day Pope Francis made a historic appearance at the meeting. Shakira lent her signature vibrato the John Lennon song, which she dedicated to Aylan and Ghalib Kurdi, two young Syrian boys who drowned fleeing violence in their home country. “Our children have the right to equal opportunities, to thrive, to be happy and healthy and safe,” she said. “Now is the time to not just imagine, but do.”

Pope Francis Addresses U.N., Calling for Peace and Environmental Justice

Excerpt:

With a passionate call from Pope Francis to choose environmental justice over a “boundless thirst for power and material prosperity,” world leaders on Friday adopted an ambitious agenda to reset their own priorities, from ending hunger to protecting forests to ensuring quality education for all.

“We want to change our world, and we can,” Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany told a packed General Assembly hall.

The global goals, which emerged after three years of negotiations, are 17 in all. Known as the Sustainable Development Goals, they are not legally binding, and therefore not enforceable. But they carry a moral force of coercion, because they are adopted by consensus by the 193 member states of the United Nations.

They apply to all countries, not just poor ones, as was the objective of the last round of ambitions, called the Millennium Development Goals, which expired this year.

“The new agenda is a promise by leaders to all people everywhere,” the secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, told the General Assembly. Central to the new set of global goals, which extend to 2030, is the idea of caring for the planet and for the world’s poorest citizens, which was also at the heart of the pope’s address — his first at the United Nations.

“Any harm done to the environment, therefore, is harm done to humanity,” Francis said, later reprising his argument that the poor are the biggest victims of environmental destruction. “A selfish and boundless thirst for power and material prosperity leads both to the misuse of available natural resources and to the exclusion of the weak and the disadvantaged,” he said.

Comment: Lyrics to Imagine below

Imagine there's no heaven It's easy if you try No hell below us Above us only sky Imagine all the people living for today

Imagine there's no countries It isn't hard to do Nothing to kill or die for And no religion too Imagine all the people living life in peace, you

You may say I'm a dreamer But I'm not the only one I hope some day you'll join us And the world will be as one

Imagine no possessions I wonder if you can No need for greed or hunger A brotherhood of man

Imagine all the people sharing all the world, you You may say I'm a dreamer But I'm not the only one I hope some day you'll join us And the world will be as one

Comment: There's a lot of worldview in Lennon's lyric. In response Psalm 2 comes to mind: "He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision."