Calls for peace and against the "arms trade": what Pope Francis said in his Christmas message
Kyiv • UNN
Pope Francis condemned the arms trade and emphasized the need for peace, drawing attention to Russia's war in Ukraine, as well as conflicts and wars in other regions, and calling for a focus on saving lives rather than profits.
In this year's Christmas message, Pope Francis mentioned the wars in Ukraine and Israel. In his calls for peace, he did not explain how to stop the aggressor, although he did speak out against against the arms buildup.
UNN reports this with reference to Vatican News.
War is an aimless path, a defeat without a winner, madness without excuses. But to say no to war, we must say no to weapons. After all, if a person with an unstable and wounded heart finds the tools of death in his hands, sooner or later he will use them. And how can we talk about peace if the production, sale, and trade of weapons is growing? Today, as in the time of Herod, the wiles of evil, opposing the Divine light, move in the shadow of hypocrisy and concealment: how many armed murders take place in deafening silence, without many people! People who need not weapons but bread, who struggle for existence and call for peace, do not know how much state money is allocated for weapons. But they should know! Let's talk about it, let's write about it, so that the interests and profits that pull the strings of wars are known
He then turned his thoughts "to the people of suffering Syria, and as well as the people of Yemen," and mentioned "the dear people of Lebanon," offering a prayer "that they may regain political and social stability as soon as possible."
In the Holy Scriptures, the Prince of Peace is opposed to the "prince of this world" (John 12:31), who, by sowing death, acts against the Lord, the "lover of life." We see his action in Bethlehem, when after the birth of the Savior, innocent babies were beaten. There are so many massacres of innocents in the world: in the womb, on the paths of people who have lost hope, in the lives of many children whose early years are devastated by war. They are the little Jesuses of today, whose childhoods have been destroyed by war, crippled by wars
Addendum
In this year's Christmas message, Pope Francis pleaded for peace for Ukraine.
