VATICAN CITY: Pope Francis led the world’s Roman Catholics in Palm Sunday celebrations by paying tribute to those killed for their faith, a reference to the victims of Islamic State militants.
Francis, who earlier this month began the third year of his papacy, presided at a colorful procession in St. Peter’s Square commemorating the day the Bible says people of Jerusalem welcomed Jesus days before he was crucified.
Thousands of people, including the 78-year-old Argentine pope and prelates dressed in red vestments, carried palm fronds and branches in St. Peter’s Square on the day that marks the start of Holy Week, which ends on Easter Sunday.
In his homily during the Mass that followed, Francis, who last month denounced the killing of 21 Egyptian Coptic Christians by Islamic State militants in Libya, paid tribute to those he said were being killed for their faith today.
“We think too of the humiliation endured by all those who, for their lives of fidelity to the Gospel, encounter discrimination and pay a personal price,” he said, speaking in Italian.
“We think too of our brothers and sisters who are persecuted because they are Christians, the martyrs of our own time. There are many of them. They refuse to deny Jesus and they endure insult and injury with dignity,” he said.
He has said that the international community would be justified in using military force as a last resort to stop “unjust aggression” but that it should not be up to a single nation to decide how to intervene in the conflict. (Reuters)
