Papal journey through Iraq

Pope Francis welcomed by the people of Kurdistan, during his visit to Kurdistan. Photo: Jon Kurdi/dreamstime.com

Pope Francis welcomed by the people of Kurdistan, during his visit to Kurdistan. Photo: Jon Kurdi/dreamstime.com

Pope Francis arrived in Iraq on March 5 with a sense of privilege, privilege that he would be welcomed by government officials, bishops and patriarchs, as well as members of various faiths and religious authorities. 

Reflecting on his visit on his return to the Vatican, he said he left the war-ravaged country with a profound sense of gratitude, not only for the hospitality he had received, but gratitude heavily tinged with the penitence of true pilgrimage. 

In his reflection on his voyage into the residue of the carnage of war, he referred to the people of Iraq as tortured, the Church as martyred, and he marvelled at the huge cross erected at the entrance to the city of Qaraqosh as symbolic of the burden the people have been carrying for so many years. 

In 2014, its church was the butt of a horrendous terrorist attack that drove the people to flight. Still, its refurbished walls and open door were there to welcome Pope Francis in the gesture of a fresh wind blowing through the city, a wind fanned by the visit of this messenger from Christ opening new horizons of peace and hope. 

However, Pope Francis reflected that he could not draw near to these tortured people without taking on himself the same cross they had been carrying for years. He found it in the festering wounds of the destruction, in the words of recollection and the luminous faces and vivacious eyes of those who awaited his presence. 

The horror cannot be relived, the same cross cannot be carried. However, the welcome from those who have borne the weight of the day reflected their sense of deep empathy and willingness to walk with them in the person of their most welcome visitor. 

Pope Francis described the land of Mesopotamia as the cradle of modern civilisation, with religious and cultural roots that go back thousands of years. He pointed out that Baghdad had housed the world's richest library, but it was destroyed. By what? By war - the scourge that devours humanity and enriches the unprincipled and scandalous forces that enable it. 

"The response is not war, but the response is a fraternity," Pope Francis said in his reflection, the fraternity that builds a culture not of enemies but of brothers and sisters. He described the choice confronting humanity today as either continuing the legacy of Cain, or building a world of brothers and sisters. He asked whether the world is listening to Cain or listening to our father in faith, Abraham, who trod the same soil the people of Iraq tread today. 

The pope said this is why he prayed together with Muslims, Christians, and people of other faiths in Ur's ancient city, where Abraham received a message from God some 4,000 years ago. He stressed that it is the same God that guided Abraham's steps guiding the steps of the people today and gives their prayer the resonance of sisters and brothers gazing at the same heavenly sky Abraham observed when he absorbed his message from God. 

He added that this experience was repeated in the Syriac-Catholic cathedral in Baghdad, where 48 people died in 2010, and on the Nineveh Plains, where the Islamic State dispersed the people, Christian and Muslim, and where the Muslim people are today reaching out to their Christian brothers and sisters calling them to return. 

At Mass in Baghdad and Erbil, he remembered that Christ opened the way to the Promised Land, to the new life where tears are dried, wounds healed and sisters and brothers reconciled. 

"Dear brothers and sisters, let us praise God for this historic visit and let us continue to pray for that land and the Middle East. Despite the roar of destruction and weapons, the palm, a symbol of this country of hope, has continued to grow and bear fruit in Iraq. So it is for fraternity: like the fruit of the palm, it does not make noise, but the palm is fruitful and grows. May God, who is peace, grant a future of fraternity to Iraq, the Middle East and the entire world," Pope Francis prayed. 

Pope Francis likened his pilgrimage among the people of Iraq to the Lenten journey, as anticipation that the grace of the celebration of Easter may be one of joy and peace in the spirit of our father in faith, Abraham, and not in the spirit of violence and death bequeathed by Cain. 

"Be weavers of fraternity wherever you are," he encouraged. Then we may experience the resurrection on Easter Sunday. 

Columban Fr Jim Mulroney resides in Essendon.

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