Pope: Religious leaders help the wounded human family

Pope Francis who in a trip had arrived in Bahrain made speech at the forum for dialogue in this country.

At the closing ceremony of the conference in the Al-Fida’ Square of Sakhir Royal Palace, Pope spoke against war, support true religious freedom, recognition of women, protection of children’s fundamental rights, and the concept of citizenship.

Pope added the world is run by war and self-interests.

He asked the religious leaders of the world to be active in helping the wounded human family.

This is to say Catholic flock make up 4 percent of the population of Bahrain. Most of them immigrants.

Pope said:”we are living at a time when humanity, connected as never before, appears much more divided than united.

He added:”We are here together because we all intend to set sail on the same waters, choosing the route of encounter rather than that of confrontation, the path of dialogue indicated by the title of this Forum: “East and West for Human Coexistence”.

Pope emphasized: “It is a striking paradox that, while the majority of the world’s population is united in facing the same difficulties, suffering from grave food, ecological and pandemic crises, as well as an increasingly scandalous global injustice, a few potentates are caught up in a resolute struggle for partisan interests, reviving obsolete rhetoric, redesigning spheres of influence and opposing blocs.”

He said:”we appear to be witnessing a dramatic and childlike scenario: in the garden of humanity, instead of cultivating our surroundings, we are playing instead with fire, missiles and bombs, weapons, covering our common home with ashes and hatred.”

Such will be the bitter consequences if we continue to accentuate conflict instead of understanding, if we persist in stubbornly imposing our own models and despotic, imperialist, nationalist, and populist visions,

Pope warned:” this will be the case, if we don’t listen to the voice of the poor, if we continue simplistically to divide people into good and bad, if we make no effort to understand one another and to cooperate for the good of all.”

He said: “We are here, as men and women who believe in God and in our brothers and sisters, to reject “isolating thinking”, which when approaching reality, overlooks the great sea of humanity by concentrating only on its own narrow currents.”

Pope insisted:”the emergence of conflicts should not cause us to lose sight of the “less evident tragedies in our human family,” such as “the catastrophic inequality whereby the majority of people on our planet experience unprecedented injustice, the shameful scourge of hunger and the calamity of climate change, a sign of our lack of care for the common home.”

The Pope underscored the important role and responsibilities of religious leaders.

The Pope proposed three areas of challenges that emerge from the Document on Human Fraternity and from the Kingdom of Bahrain Declaration, both of which were reflected on at the forum: prayer, education, and action.

Turning first to prayer, the Pope said prayer touches the human heart. For this reason, prayer, the opening of our hearts to the Most High, is essential for purifying ourselves of selfishness, closed-mindedness, self-referentiality, falseness, and injustice.

Those who pray receive peace of heart; they cannot fail to bear witness to this and to invite others, above all by their example, not to fall prey to a paganism that reduces human beings and their dignity

Pope said For this to be the case “there is one essential premise, and that is religious freedom.”

Any form of religious coercion, the Pope stated, “is unworthy of the Almighty, since He has not handed the world over to slaves, but to free creatures, whom He fully respects.”

 The Pope said: “they are called to question whether it coerces God’s creatures from without, or liberates them from within; whether it helps people to reject rigidity, narrow-mindedness, and violence; whether it helps believers to grow in authentic freedom, which is not doing what we want, but directing ourselves to the good for which we were created.”

While the challenge of prayer, the Pope said, regards the heart, that of education concerns the mind.

He stated:”If ignorance is the enemy of peace education is the friend of development, “provided that it is an education truly befitting men and women as dynamic and relational beings.”

The Pope:”said we must raise questions, allow ourselves to be challenged, and learn to enter into dialogue patiently, respectfully, and with a willingness to listen, to learn the history and culture of others.”

“For it is not enough to say we are tolerant,” the Pope said, insisting, “We really have to make room for others, granting them rights and opportunities.”

The Pope said religions can support this approach.

The Pope emphasized three urgent educational priorities.

First, he called for the recognition of women in the public sphere, namely, their right “to education, to employment, [and] their freedom to exercise their social and political rights.”

In this, as in other areas, education is the path to liberation from historical and social legacies opposed to the spirit of fraternal solidarity, which ought to mark those who worship God and love their neighbour.

Second, the Pope called for protecting “children’s fundamental rights” so that “they can grow up, receive schooling, be helped and supported, so as not to live in the grip of hunger and violence.”

The Pope said education begins in the heart of the family and continues within a community, village, or city.

The Pope stressed education for citizenship, for living in community, in respect for one another and for the law.  Then too, he emphasized the particular importance of the “concept of citizenship”, which “is based on the equality of rights and duties”.

Emphasizing the challenge of acting, the Pope recalled that Bahrain’s Declaration states that whenever hatred, violence, and discord are preached, God’s name is desecrated.

Must condemn perpetrators of violence who abuse religion’s name

“Religious men and women, as people of peace,” the Pope said, “are likewise opposed to the race to rearmament, to the commerce of war, to the market of death,” and “do not support ‘alliances against some’, but means of encounter with all. ”

The Pope called on those before him as friends, and to join him in pursuing together this path, to open our hearts to our brothers and sisters.

“If different potentates deal with each other on the basis of interests, money, and power plays, may we show that another path of encounter is possible. Possible and necessary, since force, arms, and money will never paint a future of peace,” he said.

The Pope invited religious leaders and those at the Forum to come together, for the sake of humanity, and in the name of the One who loves humanity, the One whose name is peace.

“The Creator,” he said, “invites us to act, especially on behalf of all those many creatures of His who do not yet find a sufficient place on the agenda of the powerful: the poor, the unborn, the elderly, the infirm, migrants…  If we who believe in the God of mercy do not give a hearing to the poor and a voice to the voiceless, who will do it?”

Pope Francis concluded by urging them to take their side and to make every effort to assist a “wounded and sorely tried” humanity.