Vatican City, Mar 20, 2017 / 07:46 am
During a brief meeting with Rwandan president Paul Kagame Monday, Pope Francis voiced his sadness for members of the Church who participated in the 1994 genocide, asking for forgiveness and assuring those who still suffer of his prayer.
According to a March 20 Vatican communique, during the meeting, the Pope "conveyed his profound sadness, and that of the Holy See and of the Church, for the genocide against the Tutsi."
"He expressed his solidarity with the victims and with those who continue to suffer the consequences of those tragic event," it read.
In imitation of St. John Paul II's gesture during the Great Jubilee in 2000, Francis implored God's forgiveness "for the sins and failings of the Church and its members, among whom priests, and religious men and women who succumbed to hatred and violence, betraying their own evangelical mission."