Ankara (TIP)- A new world war is being fought “piecemeal” and is endangering the future of humanity, Pope Leo has warned, as he arrived in Turkey for his first foreign trip since becoming head of the Catholic church. Speaking in Ankara, where he was welcomed on Thursday by the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Leo said the world was experiencing “a heightened level of conflict on the global level, fuelled by prevailing strategies of economic and military power”.
Recalling a description of the world’s conflicts by his predecessor, the late Pope Francis, Leo said “a third world war is being fought piecemeal”.
“We must not give in to this,” he added. “The future of humanity is at stake.”
After Leo’s visit to Turkey – a country with a Muslim majority and home to an estimated 36,000 Catholics – he is due to travel to Lebanon on Sunday.
His arrival in Beirut is especially anticipated amid fears of a deepening conflict between Israel and Hezbollah after an Israeli strike earlier this week on a neighbourhood in southern Beirut that killed four Hezbollah operatives and one of the group’s most senior military commanders.
Leo urged Turkish leaders to “embrace” the country’s role of being “a source of stability and rapprochement between peoples, in service of a just and lasting peace”, in reference to its growing role in conflict resolution efforts in Gaza, Ukraine and elsewhere.
Leo will meet Patriarch Bartholomew, the spiritual leader of the world’s 260 million Orthodox Christians, for celebrations of the 1,700th anniversary of a major early church council in Nicaea, now Iznik, which settled ideological disputes. His packed schedule also includes a visit to the Blue Mosque in Istanbul and the celebration of a Catholic mass at the city’s Volkswagen Arena.
Francis, who died in April, had planned to visit both countries but was unable to because of ill health.
Leo is considered more of a moderate, low-key operator than the charismatic but often divisive Francis, and the choice of Turkey and Lebanon for his first overseas trip is highly strategic, while also presenting an opportunity for the pope to show the world his style and personality.
In recent weeks, Turkish media has buzzed with images of Vatican delegations touring the country, while in Beirut banners showing Pope Leo’s smiling face have lined the stone outer walls of churches in the Lebanese capital’s central Christian neighbourhoods.
“This is a trip where Leo will get to promote one of the central themes of his papacy, peace – and he’ll have two different audiences in mind,” said Christopher White, a Vatican expert and author of Pope Leo XIV: Inside the Conclave and the Dawn of a New Papacy.
Be the first to comment