Receiving the artists who will perform at the Christmas concert at the Vatican, Francis said that "networking with education means allowing people to get up on their feet, to get back on their feet with full dignity" and it is also "a valid solution to open the gates of the refugee camps, allowing young migrants to enter new societies".
Pope to visit Mother Teresa birthplace in May
| VATICAN – MACEDONIA – BULGARIAIt is a "audacious" prayer, which contains seven questions to God. "None of us is required to embrace the theory that someone in the past has advanced, that is, prayer of supplication is a weak form of faith, whereas the most authentic prayer is of pure praise, that seeks God without the weight of any request ".
Speaking at the UN conference on migrations, the Vatican Secretary of State said that when the challenges posed by migration are not well managed, "crises can form, rhetoric can eclipse reason, and migrants can be seen more as threats than as brothers and sisters in need of solidarity and basic services.”
Faced with the "consolation of salvation", "let us bet on desolation, on problems. Let us ask the Lord in this week of preparation for Christmas not to be afraid but to allow ourselves be consoled by Him with tenderness.
Francis appeals "to those with institutional responsibilities" in his message to a conference held at the Gregorian university marking the 70th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. When fundamental rights are violated "we are all called into question", especially Christians, he says.
The first ever beatification ceremony in an Islamic country, in the presence of government representatives, family members of the martyrs, the main imams of the country and representatives of the religious congregations to which the new blessed belonged. The Pope: "this celebration helps to heal the wounds of the past and to create a new dynamic of encounter and coexistence".
"It will do us good today, and also tomorrow, during the week, to take this chapter IX of John and read this beautiful story of the boy blind from birth. And finish from our heart with the act of faith: 'I believe, Lord. Help my little faith '".
The first beatification in the Muslim world. Some imams also took part in the celebration in Oran. The beatification "is a form of posthumous rehabilitation, to raise the image of Algeria, blurred by the wild Islamist hordes". A suggestion to the courageous Algerian authorities: build a church for these 19 blessed.
"First of all we are called to reclaim the depressions produced by coldness and indifference, opening ourselves to others with the same sentiments of Jesus, that is, with that cordiality and fraternal attention that takes responsibility for the needs of our neighbor".
On the day of the feast of the Immaculate Conception, Francis underlines the value of Mary's "here I am!": "It is being open to the Lord, it is the cure for selfishness, the antidote to disatisfaction with life, when we feel that there is always missing something". Today, Bishop Peter Claverie and eighteen religious comrades killed in hatred of the faith are beatified in Algeria.
