Pope Kicks Off Christmas Celebrations In Shadow Of Wars
Pope Francis on Sunday kicked off global Christmas celebrations with a call for peace, as Israel’s war on Hamas and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine cast a shadow over one of the world’s favourite holidays.
Children around the globe meanwhile tracked Santa, his reindeer and their present-laden sleigh with the help of www.noradsanta.org, a 3-D interactive website run annually by a joint US-Canadian military monitoring agency.
And revellers the world over donned Santa’s red caps for a shot of holiday cheer in all sorts of leisure activities — a city race in Spopje, a surfing session in Florida, a jog in the woods on the outskirts of Paris, a dip in the sea near the port of Dover, and a dip with a drink in hand in Lake Geneva.
At the Vatican, the pope struck a somber tone.
“Tonight, our hearts are in Bethlehem, where the Prince of Peace is once more rejected by the futile logic of war, by the clash of arms that even today prevents him from finding room in the world,” the pope said, adding that Jesus “does not eliminate injustice from above by a show of force, but from below, by a show of love”.
Earlier in the day, the pontiff had said: “We are close to our brothers and sisters who are suffering from war — we are thinking of Palestine, of Israel, of Ukraine”.
