ABOARD THE PAPAL FLIGHT FROM MALTA (CNS/Vatican News): During a conversation with journalists April 3, on the flight from Malta to the Vatican, the terrible images of atrocities committed in Bucha, Ukraine, by Russian forces was brought up and Pope Francis was asked if a trip to Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine was feasible, Vatican News reported.
“I was planning to go … my availability remains constant. There is no “no”: I am available.,” the pope replied, stressing, “I said that it is on the table… but I don’t know if it can be done, …whether if would be for the best or if it is fitting to undertake it, whether I should go… all this is in the air.”
He emphasised, “War is always an act of cruelty, an inhuman thing, that goes against the human spirit; I don’t say Christian, [I say] human. It is the spirit of Cain, the “Cainist” spirit… I am willing to do whatever needs to be done.” the pope replied.
He mentioned the quiet diplomatic efforts of the Vatican secretary of state, Pietro Cardinal Parolin and the secretary for Relations with States, Archbishop Paul Gallagher, as well as the two humanitarian trips of the papal almoner, Konrad Cardinal Krajewski, to visit Ukrainian refuges in Poland.
However, CNS reported Pope Francis as telling journalists that a meeting with Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kirill is in the works.
Every war stems from an injustice, always, because that is the pattern of war. This is not a pattern for peace. For example, making investments to buy weapons. Some people say: ‘But we need them to defend ourselves.’ This is the pattern of war
“We are thinking of doing it in the Middle East,” the pope said.
“Every war stems from an injustice, always, because that is the pattern of war. This is not a pattern for peace. For example, making investments to buy weapons. Some people say: ‘But we need them to defend ourselves.’ This is the pattern of war,” Vatican News reported the pope as saying.
He remarked that when World War II ended there was a “wave of work for peace … There existed a great goodwill.”
The pope noted however, that “70 years later we have forgotten all that. That’s how the pattern of war imposes itself. There was so much hope in the work of the United Nations then. But the pattern of war has imposed itself again.”
He lamented “As humanity we are stubborn. We are in love with wars, with the spirit of Cain… the spirit of killing instead of the spirit of peace.”
Earlier, during his April 2 to 3 visit to Malta, Pope Francis met with some 200 migrants at the John XXIII Peace Lab in Hal Far, CNS reported. He insisted that migrants and refugees must be treated with care and kindness and recognised as brothers and sisters.
“Those same people we see on crowded boats or adrift in the sea, on our televisions or in the newspapers, could be any one of us, or our sons or daughters,” the pope said, adding, “Let us pray for these brothers and sisters of ours who risk their lives at sea in search of hope.”
In his talk at the centre, Pope Francis asked, “How can we save ourselves from this shipwreck which risks sinking the ship of our civilization?”
He said that the answer is “by conducting ourselves with kindness and humanity” and by regarding people not as statistics but as “what they really are: people, men and women, brothers and sisters, each with his or her own life story.”
The pope observed that in the Acts of the Apostles, when St. Paul was shipwrecked on Malta, he and his fellow passengers “were treated with ‘unusual kindness.’ Not merely with kindness, but with rare humanity, a special care and concern that St. Luke wished to immortalise.”
He urged, “Let us respond to the challenge of migrants and refugees with kindness and humanity,” adding, “Let us light fires of fraternity around which people can warm themselves, rise again and rediscover hope. Let us strengthen the fabric of social friendship and the culture of encounter, starting from places such as this.”
On April 2, the first day of his visit to Malta, Pope Francis spoke to government and civil leaders and the diplomatic corps, in the capital, Valetta, CNS reported. The pope the country and its people to remember its roots as a centre of spirituality and welcome, especially to those most in need.
Let us light fires of fraternity around which people can warm themselves, rise again and rediscover hope. Let us strengthen the fabric of social friendship and the culture of encounter, starting from places such as this
The pope acknowledged that the influx of migrants in recent years has “nurtured a certain discouragement and frustration,” the issue of migration must “be situated within a broader context of time and space,” bringing with it the “burden of past injustice, exploitation, climatic changes and tragic conflicts.”
He noted that the additional influx of refugees in Europe from Ukraine is not only further proof of the need for “a broad-based and shared response,” but Russia’s war in Ukraine has brought the long-forgotten prospect of war back into the forefront.
Warning of the risk of an “enlarged Cold War,” the pope denounced “the infantile and destructive aggression” that threatens the world due to the “seductions of autocracy, new forms of imperialism” and “widespread aggressiveness.”
However, Pope Francis said, “The solution to the crisis of each is care for those of all, since global problems require global solutions. Let us help one another to sense people’s yearning for peace.”
While praising Malta’s commitment to “defend life from its beginning to its natural end,” CNS reported that the pope also urged its leaders to remember the “rightful dignity of workers, the elderly and sick” as well as “those young people who risk squandering all the good they have within them by following mirages that leave only emptiness in their wake.”
Pope Francis said, “May Malta, the heart of the Mediterranean, continue to foster the heartbeat of hope, care for life, acceptance of others, yearning for peace, with the help of the God whose name is peace.”
