Pope Leo XIV denounced all religious wars in a video message yesterday, marking the 40th anniversary of the International Meeting for Peace in Assisi, Italy. Source: EWTN News.
“There is no such thing as a holy war: Only peace is holy,” Pope Leo said in his message. “War can never be waged in the name of God.”
The pontiff, originally scheduled to travel to Assisi for the gathering, cancelled his trip on his doctors’ advice, as he continues to recover from thoracic surgery performed on October 13.
St John Paul II established the International Meeting for Peace in Assisi in 1986 as an interreligious prayer service for peace during the Cold War.
In his message, Pope Leo highlighted a growing trend among nations to resort to armed conflict. He described the trend as a betrayal of the memory of those who lost their lives in wars during the last century.
“As the Catechism of the Catholic Church states,” Pope Leo said, “‘the accumulation of arms strikes many as a paradoxically suitable way of deterring potential adversaries from war. They see it as the most effective means of ensuring peace among nations, thus betraying the memory of the 20th century and the senseless slaughter of millions of human lives.
“Precisely in these times marked by a ‘culture of power’, there is a need to cultivate the spirit of Assisi, which entails a rejection of the religious justification of war.”
Pope Leo also paid tribute to St John Paul II in his message and urged those gathered at Assisi to remember his call for peace.
Citing his encyclical Magnifica Humanitas, Leo urged those gathered to continue promoting peace in the spirit of St Francis of Assisi, whose 800th anniversary of death is this year.
“The path of Assisi calls religious leaders to foster a climate of dialogue among the faithful and within society, so that the language of arrogance may give way to the language of peace, negotiation, and understanding,” Leo said.
“May [God] make us unarmed instruments of his peace. ‘Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God’.”
FULL STORY
‘There is no such thing as a holy war’: Pope Leo marks 40 years of Assisi peace meeting (By Ishmael Adibuah, EWTN News)
