Pope Francis and Brazil’s President Lula embrace during visit

Pope Francis delivers his Sunday Angelus message to about 20,000 faithful in St. Peter’s Square at the Vatican on Oct. 22, 2023. / Credit: Vatican Media

Vatican City, Oct 22, 2023 / 09:00 am (CNA).

During Sunday’s Angelus address, Pope Francis spoke to the faithful on the importance of the correct relationship between the Church and the state.

The pope opened with a reflection on the words in the Gospel of Matthew where Jesus says: “Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s (Mt 22:21).”

The pope inveighed against an improper understanding of these words. “These words of Jesus have become commonplace, but at times they have been used incorrectly — or at least reductively — to talk about the relations between Church and state, Christians and politics,” the pontiff said. “Often they are interpreted as though Jesus wanted to separate ‘Caesar’ from ‘God,’ that is, earthly from spiritual reality. At times we too think in this way: Faith with its practices is one thing, and daily life is another.”

The Holy Father warned against the tendency to think of the two as belonging to separate and mutually exclusive spheres. “This is a form of ‘schizophrenia,’” he said, “as though faith had nothing to do with real life, with the challenges of society, with social justice, with politics and so forth.”

Instead, “Jesus wants to help us place ‘Caesar’ and ‘God’ each in their proper place,” the Holy Father explained. “We are the Lord’s, and we must not be slaves to any earthly power,” he continued.

“The things of this world belong to Caesar, but man and the world itself belong to God: Do not forget this,” the pope implored.

According to the Vatican Gendarmeria, there were more than 20,000 faithful present in St. Peter’s Square for the Oct. 22 address.

After the end of the recitation of the Angelus, the Holy Father appealed once again for peace in the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict, which is entering its third week.

“Once again my thoughts turn to what is happening in Israel and Palestine. I am very worried, saddened; I pray and I am close to all those who suffer, the hostages, the injured, the victims and their families,” the pope said.

The pope also lamented the recent strikes at the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital and the Church of St. Porphyrius in Gaza City.

“It pains me that the Anglican hospital and the Greek Orthodox parish were also hit in recent days,” he said.

The Holy Father also continued his appeal for humanitarian efforts to not be obstructed and for the release of hostages.

“I renew my appeal for spaces to be opened up, humanitarian aid to continue to arrive, and the hostages to be freed,” the pope said.

The compound of the Greek Orthodox Church of St. Porphyrius, which was giving refuge to hundreds of Palestinian Christians and Muslims, was hit by a missile on Oct. 20. More than a dozen people were killed. The 12th-century church is the oldest church in Gaza.

“The Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem expresses its strongest condemnation of the Israeli air strike that has struck its church compound in the city of Gaza,” the Orthodox Church said in a statement following the blast.

The pope took a moment to also remember those who continue to suffer in Ukraine.

“War, every war in the world — I am also thinking of the tormented Ukraine — is a defeat,” Francis said. “War is always a defeat, it is a destruction of human brotherhood. Brothers, stop! Stop!”

At the end of the Angelus the pope reminded the faithful that next Friday, Oct. 27, will be a day of prayer and fasting and there will be an hourlong prayer vigil held in St. Peter’s Square to pray for peace in the world. The vigil will start at 6 p.m. Rome time.

The pope also briefly mentioned today’s World Mission Day, the theme of which is “Hearts on fire, feet on the move” — “Two images that say everything!” Francis said — inspired by the account of the disciples on the road to Emmaus in Luke 24.

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Pope Francis at his general audience in St. Peter’s Square on Sept. 20, 2023. / Credit: Vatican Media

Vatican City, Sep 20, 2023 / 10:04 am (CNA).

Pope Francis extolled Wednesday the “apostolic zeal” of St. Daniele Comboni, an Italian missionary priest and bishop who fought to end slavery in Africa.

Comboni witnessed “the horror of slavery” as a missionary in the mid-19th century in what is now Sudan. In his writings, he spoke of slavery more than 450 times and decried how the slave trade “degrades humankind and turns human beings, endowed like all of us with the light of intelligence, a ray of divinity and image of the most holy Trinity, to the dismal condition of animals.”

Pope Francis shared the “energetic and prophetic” life story of the founder of the Comboni missionary orders during his general audience on Sept. 20.

“Comboni’s dream was that of a Church who makes common cause with those who are crucified in history, so as to experience the resurrection with them,” Pope Francis said.

Speaking to an estimated 15,000 people in St. Peter’s Square, the pope pointed to Comboni as an example of how Christians are “called to fight every form of slavery.”

“Slavery, like colonialism, is not something from the past, unfortunately,” he added.

“In Africa … political exploitation gave way to an ‘economic colonialism’ that was equally enslaving,” he said, quoting a speech he gave in the Democratic Republic of Congo earlier this year.

Comboni summed up his vision for evangelization in Africa with the words “Save Africa with Africa,” a mindset that Pope Francis called “a powerful insight devoid of colonialism.”

“St. Daniel Comboni wanted every Christian to participate in the evangelizing enterprise,” he said. “With this spirit, he integrated his thoughts and actions, involving the local clergy and promoting the lay service of catechists.”

Comboni was born in 1831 into a poor family in a town on the shores of Lake Garda in northern Italy. After discovering his vocation to the priesthood, he was inspired by the stories he heard from missionary priests returning from Africa.

At the age of 26, he joined a missionary expedition bound for Khartoum, Sudan, in 1857, three years after he was ordained to the priesthood.

After two years in Africa, three of the five other missionaries Comboni had traveled with had died, and Comboni also became ill.

Comboni wrote to his parents: “We will have to toil, sweat, die, but the thought that we sweat and die for the love of Jesus Christ and the health of the most abandoned souls in the world is too sweet to make us give up on the great undertaking.”

The Italian missionary priest later wrote that the African people “have taken possession of my heart that lives for them alone.”

Pope Francis highlighted how “Comboni’s great missionary passion” came from “the joy of the Gospel, drawn from Christ’s love, which then led to Christ’s love.”

The priest wrote: “The Eucharistic Jesus is my strength.”

Comboni was appointed apostolic vicar of Central Africa and ordained a bishop in 1877. He died in Sudan in 1881 amid a cholera epidemic. His legacy lives on in the religious orders he founded, which are now known as the Comboni Missionaries of the Heart of Jesus and the Comboni Missionary Sisters, and are present in 42 countries on five continents.

“St. Daniele testifies to the love of the Good Shepherd who goes in search of the one who is lost and gives his life for the flock. His zeal was energetic and prophetic in being opposed to indifference and exclusion,” Pope Francis said.

“In his letters, he earnestly called out his beloved Church who had forgotten Africa for too long. … His witness seems to want to repeat to all of us, men and women of the Church: ‘Do not forget the poor — love them — for Jesus crucified is present in them, waiting to rise again.’”

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Vatican City, Nov 30, 2017 / 05:44 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis arrived in Bangladesh with words of praise for the humanitarian assistance the nation has given to Rohingya Muslim refugees, and urged greater action on their behalf from the international community.

Speaking to Bangladeshi president Abdul Harmid and the nation’s authorities and diplomatic corps, the Pope said that in recent months “the spirit of generosity and solidarity” the country is known for “has been seen most vividly in its humanitarian outreach to a massive influx of refugees from Rakhine State.”

He noted how Bangladesh “at no little sacrifice” has provided shelter and basic necessities for the hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims at their border.

With the eyes of the world watching the crisis unfold, no one “can fail to be aware of the gravity of the situation, the immense toll of human suffering involved, and the precarious living conditions of so many of our brothers and sisters, a majority of whom are women and children, crowded in the refugee camps,” he said.

It is therefore “imperative” that the international community “take decisive measures to address this grave crisis.”

Resolution, he said, means not only working to resolve the political problems that led to the mass displacement of people in recent months, “but also by offering immediate material assistance to Bangladesh in its effort to respond effectively to urgent human needs.”

Pope Francis spoke hours after arriving in Dhaka, Bangladesh, for the second phase of his Nov. 27-Dec. 2 tour of Asia. He was in Burma Nov. 27-30, and will stay in Bangladesh for two days before returning to Rome.

His visit comes amid boiling tensions over the mass exodus of the Rohingya, a largely Muslim ethnic group who reside in Burma’s Rakhine State, from their homeland amid increasing state-sponsored violence that has led the United Nations to declare the crisis “a textbook example of ethnic cleansing.”

With an increase in persecution in their home country of Burma more than 600,000 Rohingya have fled across the border to Bangladesh, where millions are in refugee camps.

Though the Vatican has said the crisis was not the original reason behind the Pope’s visit to the two nations, it has largely overshadowed the trip, with many keeping a watchful eye on how the Pope would respond, specifically when it comes to use of the term “Rohingya.”

Despite widespread use of the word in the international community, it is controversial within Burma. The Burmese government refuses to use the term, and considers the Rohingya to be illegal immigrants from Bangladesh. At the request of local Church leaders in Burma, Pope Francis refrained from using the word, and he has also done so in Bangladesh.

In his speech to authorities, the Pope praised the natural beauty in Bangladesh, which is seen in its vast network of rivers and waterways, saying the vision is symbolic of the nation’s identity as a people made up of various languages and backgrounds.

Pope Francis then pointed to the nation’s first leaders, whom he said “envisioned a modern, pluralistic and inclusive society in which every person and community could live in freedom, peace and security, with respect for the innate dignity and equal rights of all.”

Bangladesh gained independence from West Pakistan in 1971 after a bloody nine-month war that began when Pakistani military attacked their eastern state in a bid to eliminate Bengali nationalists from the region. West Pakistan began their assault in March 1971, and surrendered in December of the same year, resulting in the independence of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh.

The future of democracy in the young nation and the health of its political life, then, are “essentially linked” to fidelity to the original vision of the founding fathers, Pope Francis said.

“Only through sincere dialogue and respect for legitimate diversity can a people reconcile divisions, overcome unilateral perspectives, and recognize the validity of differing viewpoints,” Francis said, adding that true dialogue looks to the future and builds unity in the service of the common good.

This dialogue, he said, is also concerned for the needs of “all citizens, especially the poor, the underprivileged and those who have no voice.”

These words are especially relevant for Bangladesh, which is among the most populated countries in the world, but is also one of the poorest, with nearly 30 percent of the population living under the poverty line.

Francis said that while he came primarily to support the tiny Catholic community in the country, he is looking forward to meeting with interreligious leaders, as he did in Burma.

Interfaith dialogue has been a major theme of the Pope’s visit, as Burma is a majority Buddhist nation and Bangladesh is majority Muslim. In Bangladesh, 86 percent of the population practices Islam. The 375,000 Catholics there represent less than 0.2 of the total population.

In his speech, Pope Francis noted that Bangladesh is known for the sense of harmony that exists between followers of different religions, saying this atmosphere of mutual respect and interreligious dialogue “enables believers to express freely their deepest convictions about the meaning and purpose of life.”

By doing this, religions are able to better promote the spiritual values which form the basis for a just and peaceful society. And in a world “where religion is often – scandalously – misused to foment division, such a witness to its reconciling and unifying power is all the more necessary.”

Francis said this witness was seen in an “eloquent way” after a brutal terrorist attack at a bakery in Dhaka last year left 29 people dead, prompting the country’s leaders to make a firm statement that God’s name “can never be invoked to justify hatred and violence against our fellow human beings.”

Speaking of the role Catholics play in the country, Pope Francis said they have an essential contribution, specifically through the schools, clinics and medical centers run by the Church.

The Church, he said, “appreciates the freedom to practice her faith and to pursue her charitable works, which benefit the entire nation, not least by providing young people, who represent the future of society.”

He noted how many of the students and teachers in Church-run schools are not Catholic, and voiced his confidence that in keeping with the Bangladeshi constitution, the Church “will continue to enjoy the freedom to carry out these good works as an expression of its commitment to the common good.”

The Pope closed his speech assuring his of his prayers “that in your lofty responsibilities, you will always be inspired by the high ideals of justice and service to your fellow citizens.”

In his greeting to Pope Francis, Bangladesh President Abdul Harmid thanked the Pope for his visit and stressed the importance the nation places on religious freedom and development.

“People are only truly free when they can practice their faith freely and without fear,” he said, adding that in Bangladesh they “cherish” religious liberty and therefore stand with the Pope in defending it, “knowing that people everywhere must be able to live with their faith, free from fear and intimidation.”

Harmid also pointed to Francis’ message on mercy, which he said Bangladesh has put into practice with their welcome of the Rohingya Muslims.

“It is our shared responsibility to ensure for them a safe, sustainable and dignified return to their own home and integration with the social, economic and political life of Myanmar,” he said, adding that the Pope’s “passionate” condemnation of the brutality they face brings hope for a resolution.

“Your closeness to them, your call for helping them and to ensure their full rights gives moral responsibility to the international community to act with promptness and sincerity.”

The president also pointed to the problem of radical terrorist violence, saying “no religion is immune from forms of individual delusion or ideological extremism.”

The Bangladesh government, he said, is therefore pursuing a “zero tolerance” policy committed to eradicating the root causes of terrorism and violent extremism.

“We denounce terrorism and violent extremism, in all its forms and manifestations,” Harmid said, yet at the same time, like other Muslim majority countries, Bangladesh is also concerned about “the rise of Islamophobia and hate crimes in many western societies, which is adversely affecting lives of millions of peaceful people of faith.”

“We believe that inter-faith dialogue, at all levels of the society, is important to combat such extremist trends,” he said. He closed his speech with an appeal to protect the natural environment, and said the Pope’s visit “renews our resolve towards building a peaceful, harmonious and prosperous world.”

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