A day after the start of the Ukraine war, Pope Francis visited the Russian Embassy in Rome for an exchange of views. Although the Russian ambassador to the Holy See resides just a few hundred meters from the Vatican, the visit, which little was subsequently revealed, was a one-off. Because usually the Pope receives the diplomats in the Vatican and not vice versa. The next day, Francis called the Ukrainian President, who thanked him on Twitter for the conversation, in which the pontiff expressed his “deep pain” about the war, but little was known about the specific content of it either. Shortly thereafter, his cardinal secretary of state, in a sense the prime minister of the Vatican, publicly confirmed his willingness to mediate peace. Last week, two cardinals from Francis’ closest circle traveled to Ukraine. They stand for the presence of the pope and all believers, emphasized the head of the church: “They should show: The war is crazy! Stop this cruelty!”
The Pope as a peace broker: Jörg Ernesti’s book about the Vatican. – Culture
