Pope on Palm Sunday decries suffering from war, terrorism
VATICAN CITY — Pope Francis on Sunday decried a deadly attack on a Coptic church in Egypt during Palm Sunday celebrations, just weeks before his planned visit to Cairo.
The pontiff expressed his “deep condolences” to the Coptic patriarch, Tawadros II, calling him “my brother,” to the Coptic church and “all of the dear Egyptian nation,” and said he was praying for the dead and injured in the attack that occurred just hours earlier as Francis himself was marking Palm Sunday in St. Peter’s Square.
The pontiff asked God “to convert the hearts of those who spread terror, violence and death, and also the hearts of those who make, and traffic in, weapons.”
The pope’s remarks on the church attack were handed to him on a piece of paper after he remembered the victims of the Stockholm attack Friday night.