(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has arrived on the Greek island of Lesbos to visit and show solidarity with the many refugees there. The Pope touched down just after 9am Rome time after a flight from the city’s Fiumicino airport.
In a tweet posted as he left, he wrote, “Refugees are not numbers, they are people who have faces, names, stories, and need to be treated as such.”
Following his arrival by plane, Pope Francis met briefly with the Prime Minister of Greece, and is due to travel to the Mòria refugee camp, which is home to about 2,500 people.
Pope Francis will spend six hours on the island and will be accompanied by the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople and the Greek Orthodox Archbishop of Athens and All Greece, Ieronymus II.
A joint declaration will be signed while at the camp,
(from Vatican Radio)…
Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI is celebrating his birthday today. He is 89 years old.
This year Pope Francis makes a pastoral visit to the Greek island of Lesbos.
But last year, Francis offered his morning Mass at Casa Santa Marta for his predecessor saying during his Homily, “I would like to remind that today is Pope Benedict XVI’s birthday.
“I have offered the Mass for him and I also invite you to pray for him, so that the Lord may sustain him and give him much joy and happiness,” the Holy Father said this morning.”
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis’s journey Saturday 16 April to the Greek island of Lesbos is a show of solidarity for migrants “who are people; they have a history, they have dreams, they have names.” That’s according to Fr. Leon Kiskinis, the only Catholic parish priest on the island. He told Vatican Radio’s Francesca Sabatinelli that migrants need “to be treated with dignity, as human beings.”
The International Migration Organization estimates that since the beginning of this year, more than 170,000 migrants and refugees have made the treacherous journey by sea to Greece and Italy.
Since Pope Francis was elected to the papacy, Fr. Kiskinis says, he has always shown his closeness to “those on the margins, those deprived of their dignity.” He recalls that the Pope’s first journey at the start of his pontificate was to the Italian island of Lampedusa in solidarity with the tens of thousands of refugees arriving on its shores.
Saturday, Pope Francis will be visiting the Greek island of Lesbos at a time when many European countries are closing their borders to refugees. It also comes amid growing criticism of the March 18 EU-Turkey deal, which stipulates anyone arriving clandestinely on Greek islands on or after March 20 will be returned to Turkey unless they successfully apply for asylum in Greece.
Lesbos community did not “close doors or raise barriers”
Fr. Kiskinis says he thinks the Pope’s choice to visit Lesbos was not by chance.
“Lesbos is an island of call for these people who come from the Turkish coast; I do not think that this decision is random. Because, despite the presence of the authorities, institutions, non-governmental organizations, the local people, simple people, have shown a brotherhood, a humanity never seen before in these parts.”
The citizens of Lesbos “did not close the door, did not close their hearts, did not create borders or barriers,” he continues. Rather, they “welcomed these people in the hope that they can receive warmth and welcome in Europe, this Europe that it is the home of human rights.”
He expresses his conviction that migrants making the risky journey to Lesbos from Turkey are looking for a better future for themselves and their families and should “experience this European hospitality of human rights.”
Ecumenical dimension: unity of Churches to respond to migrant crisis
Fr Kiskinis explains that besides the humanitarian dimension of the papal visit, there is also the ecumenical aspect, “I believe that to solve this…migration crisis we should not work alone – we must collaborate; we must work together.” And that means not just European governments “but also the churches: the Catholic Church, the Orthodox Church, the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the Orthodox Church of Greece” should “collaborate and give witness to unity in the migration crisis.”
“We are here as Christians, without distinction of race, culture, language, religion, to give a little relief to these people, and also to raise awareness in the European community, among governments, that they need to work together…not separately, each on his own,” Fr. Kiskinis says.
“It’s not by constructing borders and barriers that one can stop these people escaping from war; they have no alternative but to get to Europe hoping for a better future . In this sense, the Pope’s visit has a great Christian ecumenical dimension.”
Small Catholic community sees Jesus in the faces of migrants
When he learned that the Pope was planning to visit the island, Fr. Kiskinis says he “was really surprised; I really didn’t believe it because I’m a parish priest, and I was not ready for a possible visit by the Pope. It’s true that the local Catholic Church is a small community, and perhaps that’s also why I am the only pastor on the island. There is only one Catholic church on this island, but it’s a community of very committed believers in welcoming these people, because our faith is not abstract, it’s real. We think we see Jesus, who was hungry, naked, a stranger, in the faces of these people. Regardless of where they come from, we try to see Christ, giving them a glass of water or a shirt to cover themselves. We want to believe that we are doing it for Jesus himself.”
Small community “on outskirts of Church” feels “pampered” by papal visit
For this reason too, the priest stresses, the Pope’s visit brings no small satisfaction to “this small community that is just on the outskirts of the Church.” Pope Francis, he adds, “is very sensitive to this condition. We are in Europe, we are also close to Italy, but in these islands where the Catholic community is just a small minority, we feel ‘pampered,’ if I may say so, by the presence of the Pope. It means showing us his affection, his appreciation for this small community that strives not only to stay alive, but also to be useful, speaking as a Christian, to these people who come from the Turkish coast.”
He notes that up until “three or four years ago” there was no permanent presence of a Catholic priest on the island but “these faithful were able to get along virtually alone, without a continuous ministry.” Four years ago, he notes, the bishop decided to place a permanent parish priest on the island “and then after four years comes the Pope! So we really feel pampered!”
People feel less involved since EU-Turkey accord
He says the islanders’ “fraternal welcoming” of the migrants has not faltered since the EU-Turkey accord. But there is some perceptible change …. A few months ago, he explains, people went out to help migrants who were arriving in small boats. Now, he notes, ships from the EU’s border management agency, Frontex and the Turkish coast guard go out to meet the boats so “people feel less involved …in providing assistance. It’s not that they don’t help, but they help less. But the relationship between the Islanders and migrants has not changed; the solidarity is still there though it’s less evident compared to some months ago.”
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) The Secretary of State of the Holy See, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, was in Poland on Friday to mark the 1050 th anniversary of the conversion of the nation to Christianity. “The Polish Church is aware of the new waves that unfailingly call us to find proper ways to be the ‘salt and light’ of the earth and the fire that warms the hearts and attracts people to the proclamation of salvation,” said Cardinal Parolin to the Polish bishops, who were gathered in plenary session on Friday morning to celebrate the recurrence.
Cardinal Parolin praised the historic faithfulness of the Polish people, saying, “[Your] faithfulness to God, to the Gospel and to the Holy See has garnered the respect and esteem of other nations, and made the Church in Poland a bulwark of Christian faith and charity and a light in the darkness that has enshrouded Europe so many times.”
Also on Friday, Cardinal Parolin met with Polish Prime Minister Beata Szydlo.
On Thursday, Cardinal Parolin celebrated Mass in the ancient Christian capital of Poland, Gniezno, during which he conveyed Pope Francis’ regards, “Who,” said Cardinal Parolin, “is here in spirit,” for the celebrations, and who is scheduled to visit Poland this summer for World Youth Day in Krakow.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) The Pontifical Academy of Sciences is holding a symposium this week to mark twenty five years since the publication of Saint John Paul II’s social encyclical “ Centesimus Annus”.
In an effort to find out more about this social encyclical Veronica Scarisbrick speaks to a Professor of Social Teaching at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas here in Rome. He’s Dominican Alejandro Crosthwaite:
It was 1987 when Pope John Paul II promulgated his social encyclical “Sollicitudo Rei Socialis”. In this document he highlighted changing circumstances, both within the debtor nations and in the international financial market:”…At a time when the instrument chosen to make a contribution to development had turned into a counterproductive mechanism. This because debtor nations, in order to service their debt, found themselves obliged to export the capital needed for improving or at least maintaining their standard of living. And also because, for the same reason, they were unable to obtain new and equally essential financing.
Through this mechanism, the means intended for the development of peoples had turned into a brake upon development instead, and indeed in some cases even aggravated underdevelopment…”
So when John Paul II published his second social encyclical “Centesimus Annus “in 1991, as the title indicates a century after Leo XIII’s “Rerum Novarum”, he picked up on this same theme. Highlighting once again how the positive efforts which have been made along those lines are being affected by the still largely unsolved problem of the foreign debt of the poorer countries :”.. The principle that debts must be paid is certainly just. However, it is not right to demand or expect payment when the effect would be the imposition of political choices leading to hunger and despair for entire peoples. It cannot be expected that the debts which have been contracted should be paid at the price of unbearable sacrifices. In such cases it is necessary to find — as in fact is partly happening — ways to lighten, defer or even cancel the debt, compatible with the fundamental right of peoples to subsistence and progress…”
(from Vatican Radio)…