Pope Francis kicked off his first full day in Colombia by encouraging the conflict ridden country to stay on the path for peace and reconciliation, telling political leaders there has been too much violence and hatred.
Addressing civic authorities, including President Juan Manuel Santos, Francis said his visit was an “incentive” to build on the recent truce deal which ended a 52 year civil war between the government and left wing militants.
“There has been too much hatred and vengeance,” the Pope told the gathering today in Bogota. “The solitude of always being at loggerheads has been familiar for decades, and its smell has lingered for a hundred years.”
The Latin American pontiff and the Vatican have supported the peace deal between President Santos’ government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc) while just before the Pope boarded the plane to Colombia the other major militant group, the National Liberation Army (ELN), announced a ceasefire. Nevertheless, the country remains divided over the agreements, which remain fragile.
“We do not want any type of violence whatsoever to restrict or destroy one more life,” Francis, who is the first Pope in 31 years to visit Colombia, said. “I have wanted to come here to tell you that you are not alone, that there are many of us who accompany you in taking this step.”
The papal visit, he added, was “a contribution that in some way paves the path to reconciliation and peace” while quoting Colombian novelist Gabriel García Márquez to stress that famines, plagues, floods and “unending wars” cannot “subdue the tenacious advantage of life over death.”
But in order for Colombia to achieve stability, Francis explained, “just laws” are needed that help the poor and marginalised.
“Laws are required which are not born from the pragmatic need to order society but rather arise from the desire to resolve the structural causes of poverty that lead to exclusion and violence,” he said. “Let us not forget that inequality is the root of social ills.”
Later in the morning the 80-year-old Argentinian Pope met with the bishops, where he urged them to speak out against the illegal drug trade, something which Colombia has been at the forefront of for decades.
“Be fearless in clearly and calmly reminding everyone that a society under the spell of drugs suffers a moral metastasis that peddles hellfire, sows rampant corruption and creates fiscal paradises,” he said.
The Pope urged them to help young people “threatened by spiritual emptiness and seeking to escape through drug use,” and to prick the consciences of those who have sold out someone “for the price of a fix of narcotics.”
In a speech peppered with imagery, Francis called on the Church to be like a tree “capable of providing shade and bearing fruit in every season, sheltering nests of life in its branches,” and for the bishops to put their trust in “smallness of God’s seeds.”
Finally, he urged them not to forget the amazon rainforest and its communities, which the Pope said is an “essential part of the remarkable biodiversity of this country.”
The Colombian Church, the Pope told them, should have an “amazonian face”, calling it to be missionary, and outward looking.
“I am told that in some native Amazon languages the idea of friend is translated by the words, ‘my other arm’ ” Francis said. “May you be the other arm of Amazonia. Colombia cannot amputate that arm without disfiguring its face and its soul.”
PICTURE: Pope Francis addresses the audience during a meeting with Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos and other government authorities in the courtyard of the presidential palace in Bogota, Colombia, 7 September
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