"Pope Francis has always indicated the path of negotiation as the way to resolve the conflict. With one conviction: conflicts always end with a negotiation, in line with the wisdom of the Church of the last hundred years.
It takes courage to negotiate! And there also wants from the international community, which must side with more conviction in favor of dialogue, creating a framework that allows us to find the law, justice and necessary securities with foresight. This can only be done together, because only together can we goes out".
It is one of the passages of the interview with Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, president of the Italian Episcopal Conference, published today by the newspaper L'Eco di Bergamo.
Answering the questions of the director Alberto Ceresoli, the man whom Pope Francis chose as an emissary to find a possible peace between Russia and Ukraine, focuses on the theme of war, but also addresses other issues of current Italian and international interest: the role of Europe, Italian politics and Catholics, the 'end of life', the current affairs and future of Christianity, relations with Islam.
On his role in Ukraine he highlights: "You make peace with those who wage war and, if you believe in negotiation, you must give life to a dialogue that involves the parties involved, obviously also that of the 'bad guy'. Saint Francis went to talking to the wolf hoping to convince him to become a docile big dog, but he knew very well that he was dealing with a wolf, so to speak, in full activity. Children understand peace. They explain it to us and they have the right to it! We are the ones who forget how much It's decisive!".
On the conflict in the Holy Land, Zuppi underlines that "the condemnation of the Pope and the Church for Hamas's aggression against Israel on 7 October was very clear: there is no justification, without forgetting History, that can make people accept a brutality and cruelty like those shown by Hamas. When you kill someone you lose all the reasons you carry in your heart. Pope Francis and the whole Church have done nothing but continue to ask for a ceasefire to avoid innocent victims and because a an exit that prevents violence like that of October 7 must be found and it is never enough to neutralize Hamas. It seems to me that a war like the one underway in the Gaza Strip is only functional to the crazy terrorism of Hamas!".
And he adds: "The advice that the American government and many others have given to Israel not to repeat the mistakes of the past in the fight against terrorism perhaps should have been listened to more."
Zuppi defines the state of health of the Church in the West as "a state of great difficulty, of great change. The individualism and practical nihilism that pervades the West has emptied hearts, paralyzed relationships, filled with fears and presumptions at the same time time".
And regarding the role of Catholics in politics, the cardinal underlines that a Catholic party in Italy "no longer exists and would have no reason to exist, also because it would be devoid of the collateralism that Italy has enjoyed for many decades. Today Catholics are everywhere: perhaps the real problem is whether they are really Catholic."
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