(Vatican Radio) The halted Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and the ongoing Syrian crisis were among the topics touched on by the Apostolic Nuncio and Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations in statement Tuesday.
In his statement to the UN Security Council during an open debate on “The situation in the Middle East, including the Palestinian Question,” Archbishop Bernardito Auza reiterated Pope Francis’ denouncement of those responsible for the Syrian crisis, especially those who provide weapons to fighters.
“Pope Francis denounces in the strongest possible terms all those responsible, from whichever side of the conflict in Syria they may come, for the senseless slaughter of civilians,” Archbishop Auza said.
“The Pope also denounces those who supply substantial amounts of money and weaponry to the fighters who kill and maim the innocent population and destroy civilian institutions and infrastructure,” he added.
“One cannot but lament the duplicity of simultaneously talking peace while supplying arms to those who kill, on every side of the conflict.”
The presidency of the UN security council is currently presided over by a delegation of Japan.
See Archbishop Auza’s full statement below:
12 July 2016
Mr. President,
The Holy See commends the Presidency of Japan for bringing the difficult situation in the Middle East once more to the attention of the International Community, in light of the release of the Quartet’s July 1st “Report on the Middle East” and in the context of the continuing violence in Syria, the deadly sectarian violence in Iraq and the stalled Israeli-Palestinian peace talks.
Mr. President,
The Palestinian Question has remained without an answer that is satisfactory to both the Israelis and the Palestinians. Almost sixty-nine years after its adoption by the United Nations General Assembly, Resolution 181 remains only half-fulfilled. Decades of negotiations have failed to achieve the creation of a Palestinian State. The time is long overdue to put an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which has become increasingly unacceptable as it becomes increasingly intractable.
My delegation would not miss this occasion to underline once again that, for the Holy See, the two-State solution holds the best promise. Durable peace will remain a distant dream and security will remain an illusion if Israel and Palestine do not agree to exist side-by-side reconciled and sovereign within mutually agreed and internationally recognized borders. Let the two States be created now, for the sake of the Israelis and Palestinians who, in the depths of their hearts, desire nothing greater than peace and security. It is time to act on the recommendations of the 1st July 2016 Report of the Quartet by bringing peace and security to the citizens of Israel and the State of Palestine and to the people of the world.
Mr. President,
The situation in Syria continues to be one of unspeakable suffering for the Syrian people who are killed, forced to survive under bombs or flee to less-ravaged areas. My delegation feels the duty to call anew the attention of this Council to the continued persecution of Christians, Yazidis and other ethnic and religious minority groups by non-State actors in parts of Syria and Iraq.
Pope Francis denounces in the strongest possible terms all those responsible, from whichever side of the conflict in Syria they may come, for the senseless slaughter of civilians.
The Pope also denounces those who supply substantial amounts of money and weaponry to the fighters who kill and maim the innocent population and destroy civilian institutions and infrastructure. One cannot but lament the duplicity of simultaneously talking peace while supplying arms to those who kill, on every side of the conflict. Pope Francis has asked: “How can you believe in someone who caresses you with the right hand and strikes you with the left hand?”
My delegation avails itself of this opportunity to plead once more to weapons-producing States strictly to limit the supply of arms to client States and to monitor their use. In particular, my delegation asks the International Community to stop the illegal supply of arms to non-state actors, who have been lately responsible for crimes against humanity and other forms of mass atrocities and egregious violations of human rights.
Statistics have clearly shown that it is the civilian population that is disproportionately victimized by ever more technologically sophisticated weapons. Remote-controlled assassinations without due process of law and the “collateral damage” to civilians by Lethal Autonomous Weapons System (LAWS) brings to the fore ethical and legal questions that merit careful review and perhaps even a challenge on the basis of international humanitarian law.
Mr. President,
The Holy See believes that peace processes do not depend solely on formal negotiations, no matter how indispensable these may be. As a cradle of great civilizations and the birthplace of the three main monotheistic religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, the Middle East has the cultural, intellectual and religious resources that make it a fertile ground for civil society and track II diplomacy, including faith-based “informal diplomacy”, to play their role in promoting the values of encounter and mutual acceptance, thereby equipping all citizens to become active protagonists in peacemaking and peacebuilding in the region.
Religions and believers, in particular, must prove themselves worthy of their rightful place in the whole process of pacification in the region. They must put an end to any form of mutual hatred that could lend credence to a “clash of civilizations.” My delegation believes that the more religion is manipulated to justify acts of terror and violence, the more religious leaders must be engaged in the overall effort to defeat the violence that attempts to hijack it for purposes antithetical to its nature. Spurious religious fervour must be countered by authentic religious instruction and by the example of true communities of faith. It is only then that faith-based “informal diplomacy” can fruitfully compliment the formal diplomacy of States and multilateral bodies.
Thank you, Mr. President.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has sent a telegram of condolences to the local archbishop after Tuesday’s deadly train collision in southern Italy.
At least 25 people were killed and around 50 were wounded in the crash, some of them critically.
Listen to Ann Schneible’s report:
In Tuesday’s telegram addressed to Archbishop Francesco Cacucci of Bari-Bitonto, and signed by Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Pope expressed “his warm and heartfelt participation in the suffering” of the families affected by the tragedy.
The Pope assured them of his “fervent prayer of intercession for those tragically killed and,” and prayed for the “swift healing of the wounded.”
Finally, Pope Francis bestowed his apostolic blessing, and entrusted all those affected by the tragedy to the “Maternal protection of the Virgin Mary.”
The crash occurred at around 11:30 in Southern Italy’s Puglia region, tearing apart three carriages and sending debris into the surrounding olive groves.
The two trains collided while on the same track connecting the small towns of Corato and Andria.
There was no immediate indication of the cause of the crash, but the government has promised a full and swift investigation.
Tuesday’s incident is Italy’s worst railway disaster in recent years.
The last major rail disaster in Italy was in 2009 when a freight train derailed the central Italian town Viareggio, killing more than 30 people living close to the tracks in the subsequent fire.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Bishop Miguel Guixot, Secretary of the Pontifical Council for Interreligiuos Dialogue, will meet senior officials of Egypt’s prestigious Al-Azhar University in Cairo Wednesday, 13 July. The visit comes at the express wish of Pope Francis following his historic meeting with the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Prof. Ahmad Al-Tayyib in the Vatican 23 May 2016.
In a note, the Council for Interreligious Dialogue said Bishop Guixot will take part in a preliminary meeting together with the Holy See’s Apostolic Nuncio in Egypt, Archbishop Bruno Musarò and Dr. Mahmoud Hamdi Zakzouk, member of the Council of Senior Scholars of Al-Azhar University and the university’s Director of the Center for Dialogue, to explore avenues for the resumption of dialogue between Al-Azhar and the Pontifical Council.
In May, the Grand Imam of al-Azhar, Professor Ahmad Al-Tayyib, granted an exclusive interview to the Vatican media following his meeting with Pope Francis.
A note from the Vatican Press Office reported that in the interview, the Imam affirmed that his visit, the first paid to the Vatican by the highest representative of Al-Alzhar, was the result of an Al-Azhar initiative and an agreement between Al-Azhar and the Vatican to continue the holy mission of religions, which consists of “making human beings joyful everywhere”. He added that Al-Azhar has a commission for interreligious dialogue with the Vatican, which was suspended in specific circumstances, but now those circumstances no longer exist, the path of dialogue has resumed in the hope that it will be better than before.
“I am happy to be the first Sheikh of Al-Azhar to visit the Vatican and to sit alongside the Pope in an encounter of discussion and understanding”, emphasised Professor Ahmad Al-Tayyib, revealing that his first impression of the Holy Father was that “he is a man of peace, a man who follows the teaching of Christianity, which is a religion of love and peace, and following His Holiness we have seen that he is a man who respects other religions and shows consideration for their followers; he is man who also consecrates his life to serve the poor and the destitute, and who takes responsibility for people in general; he is an ascetic man, who has renounced the ephemeral pleasures of worldly life. All these are qualities that we share with him, and therefore we wish to encounter this man in order to work together for humanity in this vast field we have in common.”
With reference to the duties of the great religious authorities and religious leaders in today’s world, he affirmed that these responsibilities are heavy and grave at the same time, “because we are aware, as we said also to His Holiness, that all the philosophies and modern social ideologies that have taken the lead of humanity, far from religion and far from heaven, have failed to make man happy or to take him far from wars and bloodshed.” He remarked that the moment has arrived for the representatives of the divine religions to participate strongly and in a concrete way to give humanity a new direction, towards mercy and peace, so that humanity can avoid the great crisis we are suffering now. “Man without religion constitutes a danger to his fellow man, and I believe that people now, in the twenty-first century, have started to look around and to seek out wise guides to lead them in the right direction. All this has led us to this meeting and this discussion, and to the agreement to begin to take a step in the right direction.”
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) At the Angelus on Sunday, Pope Francis reflected on the parable of the Good Samaritan.
This parable, the Pope said, in a simple, yet stimulating way, “indicates a style of life, in which the centre of gravity is not ourselves, but others.” Like the doctor of the law in the day’s Gospel, we might ask ourselves, “Who is my neighbour? Is it my friends, my parents, my fellow countrymen, my co-religionists?”
Jesus does not answer the question directly, but instead tells of the Good Samaritan, a man who did not observe the true religion, but who nonetheless helped the poor, abandoned victim of robbers – in contrast to the priest and the Levite who simply passed him by. This story, the Pope said, completely reverses our perspective. It is not up to us, he said, to try to categorize people, to see if they count as our neighbours. Rather, the decision to be, or not be a neighbour, depends on us. “It depends on me,” Pope Francis said, “it depends on me to be or not be a neighbour to the person I meet who has need of my help, even if he is a stranger, or even hostile.”
In the Gospel, Jesus tells the doctor of the law – and he tells us, too – to do as the Good Samaritan had done. We must have the attitude of the Good Samaritan to demonstrate our faith. The Pope quoted from the Apostle St James, reminding us that “faith without works is dead.” We should ask ourselves, the Pope said, if our faith is fruitful, if it produces good works, or if, on the other hand, it is sterile, “and so more dead than alive.”
We should ask ourselves this question often, Pope Francis continued, because it is precisely on this question that we will be judged at the end of our lives. The Lord, he said, will ask us, “Do you remember that time on the road from Jerusalem to Jericho? That man, who was half-dead, was me. Do you remember? That hungry child was me. Do you remember? That migrant who so many people wanted to chase away was me. Those grandparents, abandoned in rest homes, were me. Those sick people in the hospital, who no one went to find, were me.”
With that challenging reflection, Pope Francis concluded his remarks, calling on the Blessed Virgin “to help us to walk along the paths of generous love towards others, the path of the Good Samaritan.”
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has expressed his sadness following the death of Cardinal Silvano Piovanelli, Archbishop of Florence between 1983 and 2001.
In a telegramme to the current Archbishop of Florence, Cardinal Giuseppe Betori, the Pope says he shares in the grief of the Cardinal’s family and in that of the entire diocesan community.
Cardinal Piovanelli, aged 92, passed away following a long illness which he had tackled “with serenity and trustful abandonment in the will of the Lord”.
In the telegramme the Pope remembers “his dear brother who served the Gospel with joy and knowledge, loving the Church tenaciously”.
The Italian Prime Minister, Matteo Renzi, also expressed his condolences for the death of Cardinal Piovanelli describing him as a “point of reference for the faith and the life of the city of Florence”.
Born in Tuscany in Ronta of Mugello on February 21, 1924, already by age 11 Piovanelli was attending the Florence Seminary. He was ordained on July 13, 1947, and worked for 12 years as Vice-Rector of the Minor Seminary. In 1960, Piovanelli became the parish priest of Castelfiorentino, an area known for its anticlerical and atheist sentiments. He has been credited with considerable success in healing the fractures in the community. In 1979 Cardinal Benelli called Piovanelli to the Curia in Florence, initially as Pro-Vicar, and then as Vicar General. On May 28, 1982, Piovanelli was appointed Bishop of Tubune of Mauritania by Paul VI. The same year, after the death of Benelli, Piovanelli became Archbishop of Florence. John Paul II made him a cardinal during the Consistory of May 25, 1985.
Following the death of Cardinal Piovanelli, the College of Cardinals decreases in number to 212 of whom 112 are Cardinal Electors and 100 are Cardinal Non Electors.
(from Vatican Radio)…