Pope Francis calls for ‘fraternity’ in his Christmas message
AS NATIONALIST forces rise globally and populist leaders emphasise the primacy of their own people, Pope Francis used his annual Christmas Day address on Tuesday to voice his conviction that all humans are part of an extended holy family that has lost its sense of fraternity.
“My wish for a happy Christmas is a wish for fraternity,” Francis, 82, said during his Urbi et Orbi (“To the City and to the World”) benediction from a balcony above St Peter’s Square in Vatican City.
“Fraternity among individuals of every nation and culture. Fraternity among people with different ideas, yet capable of respecting and listening to one another. Fraternity among persons of different religions.”
He added: “Our differences, then, are not a detriment or a danger; they are a source of richness.”
The pope, who has been an ardent defender of migrants in a period when speaking in their defence has largely fallen out of fashion, specifically addressed the scars of war in Africa, where “millions of persons are refugees or displaced and in need of humanitarian assistance and food security”.
He called for a spirit of fraternity to be rekindled in places where conflict has prevailed.
The pope cited various conflicts, including between Israelis and Palestinians, in Yemen – where children are exhausted from “war and famine,” he said – on the Korean Peninsula, in Venezuela, Ukraine and in the “beleaguered country of Syria”.
Last week, President Donald Trump called for the withdrawal of all 2 000 US troops in Syria, suddenly announcing the end of a military campaign that has mostly crushed the Islamic State.
His critics worry that, in leaving, the US is conceding Syria to the strategic interests of Russia and Iran, and endangering the country’s ethnic Kurds who have fought side by side with the Americans against the IS militants.
“May the international community work decisively for a political solution that can put aside divisions and partisan interests, so that the Syrian people, especially all those who were forced to leave their own lands and seek refuge elsewhere, can return to live in peace in their own country,” Francis said Tuesday.
The pope’s appeals for peace and fraternity – including toward those suffering the “ideological, cultural and economic forms of colonisation” and from “hunger and the lack of educational and health care services” – were in keeping with his traditional Christmas prayers.
He also voiced concern for persecuted Christian minorities in countries or regions where the faithful have been killed or had their religious freedom suppressed.
The pope’s Christmas address and earlier remarks delivered on Christmas Eve – in which he rejected consumerism, declaring that “the food of life is not material riches but love, not gluttony but charity” – followed the pattern of last year’s addresses.
Last year, his Christmas Eve remarks focused on the “worldliness” that had taken Christmas hostage, while his Christmas Day speech made clear his concern that he was worried that serenity was sorely lacking as the “winds of war” were blowing.
But much has happened in the past year, threatening to erode the pope’s authority and the resonance of his calls for peace and justice.
The scourge of clerical sexual abuse scandals in the church hit with unprecedented force.
Reports and criminal investigations have demonstrated just how widespread, damaging and concealed the crimes have been for decades, resulting in intense pain, anger and distrust towards the Roman Catholic hierarchy. |