NEW: The families of more than 100 school children killed in the U.S. bombing of an Iranian school have written a letter of gratitude to Pope Leo XIV.
In it, they thank him for being a champion of peace and a voice for their deceased children.
The White House has yet to apologize for the incident.
Breaking news!
European Citizens' Initiative (ECI) to suspend the 🇪🇺EU 🇮🇱Israel Association Agreement has passed the threshold for 11 countries and at 1,034,599 signatures now.
🇫🇷France 🇧🇪Belgium 🇪🇸Spain 🇮🇹Italy 🇮🇪Ireland 🇫🇮Finland 🇸🇪Sweden 🇩🇰Denmark 🇳🇱Netherlands 🇵🇱Poland 🇵🇹Portugal have passed the threshold. Incredible! 🫶🏾
We needed minimum 7 countries to pass the threshold.
We have 11 countries that passed the threshold.
For a European citizens' initiative to be valid, it must obtain at least one million valid signatures and meet the minimum thresholds in at least seven countries.
This was not just on track to reach the 1 Million threshold; this may well become the most supported EU Citizen Initiative EVER.
Please keep signing! Let's show the power of the people! 🇪🇺🕊️🙏🏾
https://t.co/8CSJ2sd0Zo
In response to a personal attack by President Donald Trump the night before, Pope Leo told journalists on the papal plane to Algeria:
“I have no fear of the Trump administration or speaking out loudly of the message of the Gospel, which is what I believe I am here to do, what the Church is here to do. We are not politicians. We don’t deal with foreign policy with the same perspective he might understand it, but I do believe in the message of the Gospel, as a peacemaker.”
(Video: @OSVNews)
The Archbishop of Washington D.C. just said it directly.
“In Catholic teaching, this is not a just war.”
This isn’t a foreign pope making diplomatic statements from Rome.
This is the Archbishop of the American capital. The man who leads the Catholic Church in the city where the war was decided, where Congress was gaveled into silence, where the Pentagon threatened the Vatican’s ambassador for daring to disagree.
He just told Washington — from Washington — that what they are doing fails the moral test their own faith demands.
The just war doctrine has four criteria. A just cause. Right intention. Last resort. Proportional means.
Cardinal McElroy is saying this war fails them.
He joins Pope Leo XIV who called it unjust. Who called Trump’s threats unacceptable. Who the Pentagon summoned and threatened with the Avignon Papacy for saying so.
They threatened the Pope. They didn’t silence him.
They can’t silence the Archbishop either.
Justo hoy, Netanyahu lanza su ataque más duro contra el Líbano desde que empezó la ofensiva.
Su desprecio por la vida y el derecho internacional es intolerable.
Toca hablar claro:
- Líbano debe formar parte del alto al fuego.
- La comunidad internacional debe condenar esta nueva violación del derecho internacional.
- La Unión Europea debe suspender su Acuerdo de Asociación con Israel.
- Y no debe haber impunidad ante estos actos criminales.
8th station: Mothers weep for their children "imprisoned during protests, deported by policies devoid of compassion, shipwrecked on desperate journeys of hope, killed in war zones, & wiped out in death camps."
Grant us, Lord, a maternal heart & tears of compassion.
Notice how quickly all that bullshit about liberating Iranians disappeared, and now it's all about bombing them back to the Stone Age, destroying their bridges and universities, poisoning their air and water, and stealing their oil.
Pope Leo XIV became the second Pope to carry the Cross for the entire Via Crucis on Good Friday at Rome’s Colosseum, joined by around 30,000 faithful and countless people across the world on social media, television, and radio.
https://t.co/wKgSRkXj0P
“Jesus is the King of Peace, who rejects war, whom no one can use to justify war. He does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them.
“Even though you make many prayers, God will not listen: your hands are full of blood.” — Pope Leo XIV
La cruz es parte de la misión. La ocupación imperialista del mundo se ve interrumpida desde dentro, la violencia que hasta hoy se erige en ley queda desenmascarada. El Mesías pobre, prisionero, oprimido, se precipita en la oscuridad de la muerte, pero así saca a la luz una nueva creación. #JuevesSanto
Convicted terrorist and Israeli Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir celebrates the Knesset vote in favor of executing Palestinian prisoners by a wide margin
It’s a death cult, folks
After being denied entrance to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre by Israeli police earlier today, in powerful moment, Cardinal Pizzaballa blessed the city of Jerusalem with a relic of the Holy Cross; the brief service took place at the foot of the Mount of Olives.
"Jesus is silent, not because he has nothing to speak, but because he will not follow the logic of verbal violence. His silence is a refusal to participate in the game of power that crushes. It is a silence that refrains from fueling the cycle of evil, nor does it seek to hurt anyone" - Quote from the Palm Sunday Meditation of H.B. Card. Pizzaballa
The world, Europe, and Spain have faced this critical moment before. In 2003, a few irresponsible leaders dragged us into an illegal war in the Middle East that brought nothing but insecurity and pain.
Our response then must be our response now:
NO to violations of international law.
NO to the illusion that we can solve the world’s problems with bombs.
NO to repeating the mistakes of the past.
NO TO WAR.
https://t.co/KpRjBfwY4B