Mosul, Iraq, Feb 24, 2010 / 12:57 pm
The Vatican communicated on Wednesday that the Holy Father reacted with "deep sorrow" upon hearing the news of the most recent killings of Christians in Iraq, which reached him while he was on his annual Lenten retreat. The Holy See had urged respect for Iraqi Christians in a January letter to country's premier, but after continuing violence Christians have started to flee the city.
The Vatican's newspaper L'Osservatore Romano reported the Pope's sadness upon learning of the assassination of the father and two brothers of a Syro-Catholic priest in Mosul on Tuesday. He reacted with "deep sorrow," the paper said, while also relaying the Pope's closeness through prayer and affection "to all who suffer the consequences of violence."
Cardinal Secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone had written a letter to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Kamil Mohammed al-Maliki on Jan. 2, at the Pope's behest, inviting a "moral and civil reconstruction" of the nation through "dialogue and cooperation between ethnic and religious groups... including minorities."
He expressed his hope that this would happen in "full respect of the individual identities of those groups, in a spirit of reconciliation and in search of the common good."