Pope: Protecting every life is the basis for peace
On the first day of the year, Pope Francis urges the faithful to protect life "from conception to natural death,” so that everyone “may look with hope to the future’.” In Mary’s name, the pontiff mentioned mothers with hearts “full of pain” because of war.
Vatican City (AsiaNews) – Pope Francis delivered his message to the world today, the first day of the year and the 58th World Day of Peace.
In it, the pontiff notes that the Church calls on the faithful to contemplate in Mary’s Divine motherhood the mystery of Jesus "born of a woman", in order “to restore dignity to the lives of everyone ‘born of woman’, for this is the basis for building a culture of peace.” This includes respect for life, "from conception to natural death", as well as facing the horrors of today's wars.
Today began with Mass in the Vatican Basilica. In his homily, Francis urged the faithful to fix our gaze on Jesus "born of a woman".
“Let us entrust this new year to Mary, Mother of God. May we learn, like her, to discover God’s greatness in the little things of life. May we learn to care for every child born of a woman, above all by protecting, like Mary, the precious gift of life: life in the womb, the lives of children, the lives of the suffering, the poor, the elderly, the lonely and the dying.”
“Today, on this World Day of Peace, all of us are invited to take up the summons that flows from the maternal heart of Mary: to cherish life, to care for wounded lives,” he said.
“For this reason, ‘I ask for a firm commitment to respect for the dignity of human life from conception to natural death, so that each person may cherish his or her own life and all may look with hope to the future’.”
The pope placed the Jubilee Year in Mary’s care. “Let us entrust to her our questions, our worries, our sufferings, our joys and all the concerns that we bear in our hearts. [. . .] Let us entrust to her the whole world, so that hope may be reborn and peace may finally spring up for all the peoples of the earth.”
During the Angelus, Francis said to look at "mothers whose hearts are full of pain, because their children have been taken away by violence, pride, hatred. How beautiful is the peace that gladdens the life of peoples! How inhuman war is, which breaks the hearts of mothers".
The pontiff thanked all those working to find solutions to the ongoing wars in Palestine, Israel, tormented Ukraine, and Myanmar. “Let us pray that fighting may cease on every front and work for peace and reconciliation be done," he said. “War always destroys, war is always a defeat."
Finally, citing his message for this World Day of Peace, Francis once again renewed the Jubilee appeal to "cancel or reduce as much as possible the debts of the poorest countries.”
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01/01/2006
01/01/2020 14:07
