Pope Francis urged peace around the world in his traditional Christmas address, calling for weapons in Syria to fall silent and offering comfort to victims of terrorism.
In his Christmas Day homily, delivered in front of thousands of people from the balcony of St Peter’s Basilica in Rome, he urged Christians to think in particular about the plight of children today who find themselves fleeing war zones and lamented that others are prevented from being born at all.
On Christmas Eve the Pope said that Christmas had been “taken hostage” by dazzling materialism that puts God in the shadows and blinds many to the needs of the hungry, the migrants and the war weary.
Francis, leading the world’s 1.2 billion Roman Catholics into Christmas for the fourth time since his election in 2013, said in his Christmas Eve homily that a world often obsessed with gifts, feasting and self-centeredness needed more humility.
“If we want to celebrate Christmas authentically, we need to contemplate this sign: the fragile simplicity of a small newborn, the meekness of where he lies, the tender affection of the swaddling clothes. God is there,” the Pope said at St. Peter’s Basilica.
At the solemn but joyous service, attended by some 10,000 people as well as dozens of cardinals and bishops, Pope Francis said the many in the wealthy world had to be reminded that the message of Christmas was humility, simplicity and mystery.