General Audiences returned to St. Peter's Square and with it, the popemobile filled with little ones accompanying Pope Francis.
For this audience, Francis postponed his weekly catechesis to make an appeal for the welcoming of migrants.
POPE FRANCIS
It must be said clearly: there are people who work systematically and use all means to reject migrants…to reject migrants. And this, when done conscientiously and knowingly, is a grave sin.
Pope Francis continued with saying that many of the migrants who arrive from Africa to Europe risk their lives during the journey. Many, he said, die in the desert or become victims of human trafficking.
POPE FRANCIS
In the age of satellites and drones, there are migrant men, women and children that no one “should see.” They are hidden. Only God sees them and hears their cry and this is a cruelty of our civilization.
It is not through more restrictive laws, it is not by militarizing the borders, it is not by rejection that we will get results. We will get them by expanding safe and regular access routes for migrants.
Pope Francis then mentioned the case of Pato, the migrant who lost his daughter and wife in the desert, where they died of thirst and hunger. His story moved the Pope to the point of asking the Vatican Museums to give him a job.
JRB
TR: AT
