Pain must never give rise to violence and every Catholic needs to learn to safeguard with tenderness those who are vulnerable, Pope Leo XIV said during a prayer vigil for people suffering illness, bereavement, violence or abuse. Source: OSV News.
Recognising that some members of the Church “have unfortunately hurt you,” the Pope said the Church “kneels with you today before our Mother (Mary). May we all learn from her to protect the most vulnerable with tenderness!”
“May we learn to listen to your wounds and walk together,” he said in his homily yesterday, the feast of Our Lady of Sorrows. “May we receive from Our Lady of Sorrows the strength to recognise that life is not defined only by the evil we suffer, but by the love of God, who never abandons us and guides the whole Church.”
The Pope led the prayer vigil in St Peter’s Basilica yesterday as part of the Jubilee of Consolation, which is “dedicated to all those who are experiencing or have experienced moments of particular difficulty, grief, suffering or hardship in their lives”.
During the vigil, two women offered their reflections and experience of losing a loved one to senseless violence and finding consolation, reconciliation and new life through their faith.
Lucia Di Mauro, spoke about forgiving and supporting the young man who was an accomplice in the 2009 murder of her husband, Gaetano Montanino, in Naples.
Diane Foley spoke about her son, James Foley, a US journalist who worked in conflict zones and was kidnapped, once in Libya, then in Syria, where he was ultimately beheaded by members of ISIS in 2014.
“Anger surged within me; anger at ISIS, at our US government, at those who refused to help. Bitterness threatened to consume me,” Ms Foley said.
She found comfort in the Stations of the Cross and the unexpected happened when Alexanda Kotey, one of the jihadists who had kidnapped and tortured her son, offered to meet with the family after he pleaded guilty to all eight counts of kidnapping, torture and murder.
“The three days of meeting with Alexanda became moments of grace,” she said, as “God gave me the grace to see him as a fellow sinner in need of mercy, like me”.
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Pope urges Church to listen to sorrows of abuse victims, walk together (By Carol Glatz, OSV News)
