22 April 2017 | Homily

LITURGY OF THE WORD WITH THE COMMUNITY OF SANT’EGIDIO IN MEMORY OF THE MARTYRS OF THE 20th AND 21st CENTURY: HOMILY OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS

Church of St Bartholomew on Tiber Island

[…] Today, I would like to add one more icon, in this Church. A woman. I do not know her name. But she is watching us from heaven. I was in Lesvos; I was greeting the refugees and I found a 30-year-old man, with three children. He looked at me and said: “Father, I am a Muslim. My wife was Christian. Terrorists came to our country, they looked at us and asked us our religion and saw her with the Crucifix, and they asked her to throw it on the ground. She did not do so and they cut her throat in front of me. We loved each other so much!”. This is the icon that I bring here today as a gift. I do not know if that man is still in Lesvos or has managed to go elsewhere. I do not know if he was able to get out of that concentration camp, because refugee camps — so many — are like concentration camps, because of the crowd of people who are left there. And the generous people who welcome them must also continue to bear this burden, because it seems that international agreements are more important than human rights. And this man did not have rancour: he, a Muslim, had this painful cross, carried on without rancour. He took refuge in the love of his wife, graced with martyrdom. […]