Pope Francis spoke to the Italian Corriere Della Sera, in which, among other things, he referred to the Patriarch of Moscow, and the stance he has taken since the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
As reported by ertnews.gr, if Kirill is the man who can ‘convince’ Putin, the article points out that ‘the Pontiff shakes his head’ and says: ‘I talked to Kirill for forty minutes through Zoom. The first 20, with a card in hand, read me all the excuses for the war.
I heard him and I said, “I don’t understand any of this. Brother, we are not clergymen of the State, we cannot use the language of politics, but of Jesus. We are shepherds of God’s own holy peoples, which is why we must seek peace and silence the weapons.”
Pope Francis also added that “the Patriarch cannot become Putin’s priest” and stressed that the scheduled meeting between the two religious leaders in Jerusalem on June 14 “would be the second face-to-face meeting”.
Although it has nothing to do with the war, “now he agrees: let’s stop, it could be an ambiguous message.”