re all the more entitled to the protection and assistance required by their condition. Therefore, the State should help the family to accept the handicapped, favor their integration into society, and to let them benefit from the special provisions for their condition so that they can fully enjoy all their fundamental rights.46
51. The task of deepening the meaning of the right to adoption is very topical, while always keeping in mind that "the best interests of the child shall be the paramount consideration",47 without mixing this with other kinds of consideration, as noble as they may seem. In the light of this higher interest, the categorical rejection must be confirmed of the alleged right to adoption by "de facto unions", and especially by same sex unions. In such cases, the child's integral formation would be seriously jeopardized.
5. SOLIDARITY AND BROTHERHOOD
5.1. Participation and Freedom
52. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights exhorts all human beings to act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.48 In this statement, the document is in harmony with Christian social thought and its defense of human solidarity. As fully entitled members of the human family, every man and every woman has the right and responsibility to participate in social, political and cultural life locally, nationally and internationally. The human person participates in the human family by his very nature. Our humanity is shared and the fact that we are persons binds us to the rest of the human community in an immediate and irrevocable way. By virtue of the bonds of solidarity and brotherhood, we can speak about a human family, the family of peoples.
53. For participation to achieve its full meaning, it must be consciously practiced and chosen. The social virtue of solidarity is the will to participate in the search for social justice. It should not be forgotten that "the exercise of solidarity within each society is valid when its members recognize one another as persons". This implies that "those who are more influential, because they have a greater share of goods and common services, should feel responsible for the weaker and be ready to share with them all they possess. Those who are weaker, for their part, in the same spirit of solidarity, should not adopt a purely passive attitude or one that is destructive of the social fabric, but, while claiming their legitimate rights, should do what they can for the good of all".49 Solidarity therefore means accepting our social nature and affirming the bonds we share with all our brothers and sisters. Solidarity creates a context in which mutual service is favored. Solidarity creates the social conditions for the respect and support of human rights. The ability to recognize and accept the whole range of rights and corresponding obligations that are based on our social nature can only be exercised in an atmosphere enlivened by solidarity. This also holds in the light of the growing interdependence which "must be transformed into solidarity, based upon the principle that the goods of creation are meant for all".50
5.2. Commitment to the Weakest
54. Our solidarity with the whole human family implies a special commitment to the most vulnerable and marginalized. They should be a privileged category for the love and care of others. The natural unity of the human family cannot be fully achieved when peoples are suffering from poverty, discrimination, oppression and social alienation that lead to isolation and detachment from the community at large.
55. However, our commitment in love must be voluntary if it is to be virtuous. In a special way, solidarity urges us to seek relations that tend toward equality on the local, national and international levels. All the members of the human community should be incorporated in the fullest way possible into the circuits of productive and creative relations.51
56. The peoples of the Third World in particular have suffered the onslaughts of the enemies of life and thus deserve our special attention. Diseases such as AIDS, malaria, etc., crop failures, 