THE MIRACLE WORKER: BONO REFLECTS ON 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE TREATY OF ROME<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n (Photo: Signing of the Treaty of Rome, March 25, 1957)<\/p>\n A Time for Miracles<\/span><\/span> Fifty years ago this week, the idea of Europe was set to paper, on a continent unsettled but past the worst of the postwar period. The air was clear of sulfur if not spleen. Ireland was a small rock in the North Atlantic made relevant only by its cultural totems and ever increasing diaspora. In Berlin a chasm was opening up between East and West\u2013the partition of lives, fortunes and fates. In the global struggle between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., between freedom and totalitarianism, Europe was the fault line and the front line. Old Europe was being rebuilt to fight the next war: a battle not just of ideologies but also, very possibly, of nuclear arsenals. It was not a moment for dreaming\u2013more like one for digging a basement and ordering a year\u2019s supply of tinned soup.<\/p>\n And yet this was the moment the New Europe was born.<\/p>\n On the continent that had been the theater for mankind\u2019s darkest hour, we witnessed a very human miracle. The people of Europe found that their capacity for destruction was mirrored by an equally immense capacity for forgiveness, grace and hope. Looking to the U.S., Europeans could see how cherry-picked European ideas from minds like Locke, Rousseau and Tom Paine could flourish in a society not polluted by blood and aristocracy. And so, in 1957, six nations signed the Treaty of Rome and, with that one crucial act, built a showcase of multilateralism, prosperity and international solidarity.<\/p>\n Fast-forward 50 years. An Irish rock star reads the treaty with the enthusiasm a child has for cold peas but does uncover what I think technocrats might call poetry. Not much of it\u2013just a turn of phrase here and there. Like Article 177, which summons the signatories to foster \u201cthe sustainable economic and social development of the developing countries and more particularly the most disadvantaged among them\u201d and calls for a \u201ccampaign against poverty in the developing countries.\u201d Not exactly Thomas Jefferson but a glimpse of the kind of vision that might bind us. THE MIRACLE WORKER: BONO REFLECTS ON 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE TREATY OF ROME (Photo: Signing of the Treaty of Rome, March 25, 1957) A Time for MiraclesBy Bono Fifty years ago this week, the idea of Europe was set to paper, on a continent unsettled but past the worst of the postwar period. The air […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2102,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2711],"class_list":["post-407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
By Bono<\/p>\n
READ THE ENTIRE ESSAY AT TIME.COM HERE<\/a>
READ ABOUT THE TREATY OF ROME HERE<\/a><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"