10 years of Pope Francis’ Mediterranean travels
Lampedusa – July 8, 2013 : « I felt that I had to come here today to pray, to make a gesture of closeness, but also to awaken our consciences so that what happened is not repeated. »
Tirana – September 21, 2014 : « Each religious tradition, within itself, must succeed in accounting for the existence of the other. »
Jerusalem – May 24-26, 2014 : “We are called, as Christians and as Jews, to question ourselves deeply about the spiritual significance of the bond that unites us. It is a bond that comes from above, that goes beyond our will and that remains intact, despite all the difficulties of relationships unfortunately experienced throughout history.
Sarajevo – June 6, 2015 : « We need to communicate, to discover each other’s riches, to value what unites us and to look at differences as opportunities for growth with respect for all. »
Lesbos – April 16, 2016 : « We need to build bridges. But the bridges are made with intelligence, they are made through dialogue, through integration. »
Assisi – September 20, 2016 : « We, as religious leaders, are bound to be strong bridges of dialogue, creative mediators of peace. »
Cairo – 28-29 April 2017 : « Young people who, like well-planted trees, are rooted in the ground of history and, growing upwards and alongside others, daily transform the polluted air of the hatred in oxygen of brotherhood.
Skopje – May 7, 2019 : « The diversity of religious affiliation of Orthodox, Muslims, Catholics, Jews and Protestants, as the ethnic distinction between Macedonians, Albanians, Serbs, Croats and people of other origin, have created a mosaic in which each piece is necessary for the originality and beauty of the overall picture. Beauty that will gain in splendor to the extent that you know how to transmit it and sow it in the hearts of new generations. »
Rabat – March 30-31, 2019 : « It is essential, in order to participate in the construction of an open, plural and united society, to develop and constantly and without weakness assume the culture of dialogue as a path to follow; collaboration as conduct; reciprocal knowledge as method and criterion. »
Bari – February 23, 2020 : « The Mediterranean has a particular vocation in this sense: it is the sea of interbreeding, « culturally always open to encounter, dialogue and reciprocal inculturation ». The purity of races has no future. The message of miscegenation tells us a lot. Giving onto the Mediterranean therefore represents an extraordinary potential: let us not allow the conviction to the contrary to spread, out of a nationalist spirit, that is to say that the less accessible and geographically more isolated States would be privileged. Only dialogue allows us to meet each other, to overcome prejudices and stereotypes, to tell stories and to get to know ourselves better. Dialogue and that word I heard today: friendliness. »
Nicosia – December 2, 2021 : « You are immersed in the Mediterranean: a sea of different histories, a sea that has cradled so many civilizations, a sea from which people, peoples and cultures still disembark today from all parts of the world. Through your fraternity, you can remind everyone, all of Europe, that to build a future worthy of man, we must work together, overcome divisions, tear down walls and cultivate the dream of unity. »
Marseille – September 23, 2023 : “Next year, I will go to Marseille for the Mediterranean Meeting. »