26 81. All religions devote attention to human suffering, and attempt to provide the needed transcendental support to the faithful; all religions focus on the relations between life and death, and provide distinct interpretations and explanations of human destiny and after-life92. Undue interferences in human beliefs - whatever religion they may be attached to - cause harm to the faithful, and the International Law of Human Rights cannot remain indifferent to such harm. It is to be duly taken into account, like other injuries, for the purpose of redress. Spiritual damage, like the one undergone by the members of the Moiwana Community, is a serious harm, requiring corresponding reparation, of the (non-pecuniary) kind I have just indicated. XI. Concluding Observations: A Plea against Oblivion. 82. In one of his latest publications, Memory and Identity (2005), the late Pope John Paul II sustained that each person has a "spiritual patrimony" to preserve, and the cultivation of memory assists one in precisely preserving his or her own identity93; it is due to the memory, that each person, or human collectivity, preserves they, and - he added - the defence of such identity is ultimately a matter of survival94. John Paul II recalled, in particular, the tragic historical experience of his own people and homeland, - the Polish, - which, despite having been attacked by their neighbours, divided and occupied by foreigners, nonetheless survived, because they conserved their identity, cultivated their memory, and based themselves, in times of utter adversity, on their own culture95 (including language and religion). 83. Memory is, ultimately, the faculty that preserves the identity of human beings, at both personal and collective levels96. The cultivation of memory of events occurred in times of repression, - in particular grave violations of human rights, - has in recent years been fostered by the work of successive Truth Commissions in distinct continents97. This suggests the awakening of the universal juridical conscience as to the need to combat the imposition of oblivion and impunity. . Cf., e.g., [Various Authors,] Life after Death in World Religions, Maryknoll N.Y., Orbis, 1997, pp. 1-124. 92 . Juan Pablo II, Memoria e Identidad - Conversaciones al Filo de Dos Milenios, Buenos Aires, Ed. Planeta, 2005, pp. 95, 109, 131 and 183. 93 . Ibid., pp. 176-177. 94 . Ibid., p. 109, and cf. pp. 28, 169-170 and 176-177. 95 . Ibid., p. 177. 96 . For a study, cf. A.A. Cançado Trindade, Tratado de Direito Internacional dos Direitos Humanos, vol. II, Porto Alegre/Brazil, S.A. Fabris Ed., 1999, pp. 400-403, and sources referred to therein. 97

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