Vatican City, 25 December. (Adnkronos) – Ukraine and Russia must dialogue. And enough hatred and violence, let’s practice peace. These were the words of Leo XIV at the Urbi et Orbi today 25 December in front of 26 thousand people.
“We pray in a particular way for the tormented Ukrainian people: may the clash of weapons stop and the parties involved, supported by the commitment of the international community, find the courage to dialogue in a sincere, direct and respectful way”, was the heartfelt appeal of the Pope for whom “we can and must each do our part to reject hatred, violence, opposition and practice dialogue, peace, reconciliation”.
“Let us not allow ourselves to be overcome by indifference towards those who suffer, because God is not indifferent to our miseries”, said the Pontiff in the Christmas message to the Urbi et Orbi, turning his attention to all human suffering: “In becoming man, Jesus takes upon himself our fragility, he identifies himself with each of us: with those who no longer have anything and have lost everything, like the inhabitants of Gaza; with those who are prey to hunger and poverty, like the Yemeni people; with those who are fleeing their homeland to look for a future elsewhere, like the many refugees and migrants who cross the Mediterranean or travel across the American continent; with those who have lost their jobs and with those who are looking for it, like the many young people who struggle to find work; with those who are exploited;
The Pontiff sent Christmas greetings in ten languages from the central loggia of the Vatican Basilica to the faithful gathered in St. Peter’s Square and to those who listened to him on the radio and television. The “Merry Christmas! May the peace of Christ reign in your hearts and in your families” was repeated by Leone in Italian, French, English, German, Spanish, Portuguese, Polish, Arabic, Chinese, Latin. And he granted plenary indulgence by pronouncing the Latin formula. Then, the performance of the Vatican and Italian anthems.
“To the heart of God – observes Leone – comes the invocation of peace that rises from every land, as a poet writes: ‘Not the peace of a cease-fire, not even the vision of the wolf and the lamb, but rather as in the heart when the excitement is over and one can only speak of a great tiredness. May it come like wild flowers, suddenly, because the field needs it: wild peace’. On this holy day, let us open our hearts to the brothers and sisters who are in need and pain.”
“How can we not think of the tents in Gaza, exposed for weeks to rain, wind and cold, and those of many other refugees on every continent, or the makeshift shelters of thousands of homeless people in our cities?”. The Pope lashed consciences in a passage of the homily delivered at the Christmas mass in St. Peter’s.
“The flesh of defenseless populations is fragile, tested by many wars in progress or concluded, leaving rubble and open wounds. Fragile – Leo
Many brothers and sisters “stripped of dignity and reduced to silence”, he said again. “‘Flesh is the radical nakedness for which even the word is missing in Bethlehem and on Calvary; as a word there are not many brothers and sisters stripped of their dignity and reduced to silence. Human flesh – says Leone – asks for care, invokes acceptance and recognition, seeks hands capable of tenderness and minds willing to pay attention, desires good words”.
The Pontiff explains “the paradoxical way in which peace is already among us: God’s gift is engaging, seeks acceptance and activates dedication. It surprises us because it exposes itself to rejection, it enchants us because it tears us away from indifference”. “It is a true power to become children of God: a power – he says – that remains buried as long as we are detached from the crying of children and the fragility of the elderly, from the helpless silence of the victims and from the resigned melancholy of those who do evil that they do not want”.
“When the fragility of others penetrates our hearts, when the pain of others shatters our granite certainties, then peace already begins. The peace of God is born from a cry welcomed, from a cry heard: it is born among ruins that invoke new solidarity, it is born from dreams and visions which, like prophecies, reverse the course of history”, underlines the Pontiff who observes:. “All this exists, because Jesus is the meaning from which everything took shape. This mystery challenges us from the nativity scenes we have built, it opens our eyes to a world in which the Word still resonates, ‘many times and in different ways’, and still calls us to conversion”.
“Of course – Leone points out – the Gospel does not hide the resistance of darkness to the light, it describes the path of the Word of God as an impervious road, strewn with obstacles. Until today the authentic messengers of peace follow the Word on this path, which finally reaches the hearts: restless hearts, which often desire precisely what they resist”.
The Pope quoted his predecessor in a passage from Evangelii Gaudium: “As the beloved Pope Francis wrote, to remind us of the joy of the Gospel: ‘Sometimes we feel the temptation to be Christians while maintaining a prudent distance from the wounds of the Lord. But Jesus wants us to touch human misery, to touch the suffering flesh of others. He waits for us to give up looking for those personal or community shelters that allow us to keep ourselves at a distance from the crux of the human drama, so that we truly accept entering into contact with the concrete existence of others and we know the strength of tenderness’”.
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