Jerusalem church leaders barred from Holy Sepulchre on Palm Sunday

Preaching in St Peter’s Square, Pope Leo said ‘no one can use Jesus to justify war’ and that he ‘does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them’.

Police prevented the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem and the Custos of the Holy Land from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulchre to celebrate Mass on Palm Sunday.

A joint statement from the Latin Patriarchate and the Franciscan Custody of the Holy Land said Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa and Fr Francesco Ielpo OFM “were stopped en route, while proceeding privately and without any characteristics of a procession or ceremonial act, and were compelled to turn back”.

Last week the patriarchate cancelled its Palm Sunday procession due to Israeli government security regulations prohibiting public gatherings during the war with Iran, but the Custody had insisted that liturgies would continue in the Holy Places even if crowds could not attend. It was not clear whether police closed other religious sites in Jerusalem on Sunday.

“As a result [of the police obstruction], and for the first time in centuries, the Heads of the Church were prevented from celebrating the Palm Sunday Mass at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre,” said the joint statement.

“This incident is a grave precedent and disregards the sensibilities of billions of people around the world who, during this week, look to Jerusalem.”

Referring to the cancellation of public gatherings, the statement insisted that the Heads of Churches in the Holy Land “have complied with all imposed restrictions” on worship.

“Preventing the entry of the cardinal and the Custos, who bear the highest ecclesiastical responsibility for the Catholic Church and the Holy Places, constitutes a manifestly unreasonable and grossly disproportionate measure,” it continued.

“This hasty and fundamentally flawed decision, tainted by improper considerations, represents an extreme departure from basic principles of reasonableness, freedom of worship and respect for the Status Quo [agreement on access to the Holy Sepulchre].”

A statement on social media from the office of Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said police acted with “no malicious intent whatsoever, only concern for [the patriarch’s] safety and that of his party”.

Religious and political leaders around the world condemned the Israeli authorities’ action. In the UK, the Archbishop of Westminster Richard Moth called it “a clear denial of freedom of worship”. His predecessor Cardinal Vincent Nichols said it was “ill-thought-out, disproportionate and unacceptable” and a cause of “deep distress and scandal”.

“The events of today are deeply troubling,” said Bishop James Curry, an auxiliary in Westminster who speaks for the bishops of England and Wales on the Holy Land and on freedom of religion and belief. “Restricting the right to freedom of worship calls into question the agreed Status Quo for the holy sites in Jerusalem and Bethlehem.”

In a further statement on Sunday evening, Netanyahu said he had directed the Jerusalem authorities that Cardinal Pizzaballa “be granted full and immediate access to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre” so that he “may hold services as he wishes”.

“To protect worshippers, Israel asked members of all faiths to temporarily abstain from worshipping at the Christian, Muslim and Jewish holy sites in Jerusalem’s Old City,” he said. “Today, out of special concern for his safety, Cardinal Pizzaballa was asked to refrain from holding Mass at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.”

Speaking at the Angelus after the Palm Sunday Mass in St Peter’s Square, Pope Leo prayed for “the Christians of the Middle East, who are suffering the consequences of a brutal conflict and, in many cases, are unable to observe fully the liturgies of these holy days”.

“Just as the Church contemplates the mystery of the Lord’s Passion, we cannot forget those who today are truly sharing in his suffering,” he said. 

“Their ordeal challenges all our consciences. Let us raise our prayer to the Prince of Peace that he may sustain the peoples wounded by war and open concrete paths to reconciliation and peace.”

In his homily at the Mass beforehand, Pope Leo emphasised how Jesus “reveals himself as the King of Peace, even as war looms around him”, and by refusing to fight his captors “revealed the gentle face of God, who always rejects violence”.

“Brothers and sisters, this is our God: Jesus, King of Peace, who rejects war, whom no one can use to justify war. He does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them, saying: ‘Even though you make many prayers, I will not listen: your hands are full of blood,’” he said, citing Isaiah 1:15.

Observers suggested this was a rebuke to the US secretary of defence Pete Hegseth, who at a prayer service in the Pentagon on Wednesday prayed that “every round find its mark against the enemies of righteousness and our great nation” and that US troops exercise “overwhelming violence of action against those who deserve no mercy”.

On Sunday, Prime Minister Netanyahu announced the expansion of Israeli military operations in southern Lebanon, which have displaced more than one million people and killed more than 1,000 over the past month.

Iranian leaders have claimed that the US is preparing for a ground offensive even as it pursues negotiations to end the war. US officials told The Washington Post this week that the Pentagon is preparing for ground operations in Iran.

In a joint Easter message issued on Friday, the Patriarchs and Heads of Churches in Jerusalem condemned the “new and devastating regional war [that] has once again plunged the Holy Land and the wider Middle East into turmoil”.

“Each passing day has brought increasingly fierce escalations – a relentless cycle of death, destruction and frightful suffering that now ripples across the globe in rising economic hardship,” they said.

“From the blackened smoke of this expanding wreckage, a deep darkness has engulfed our region, as stifling as the air inside the sealed tomb of the crucified Christ. Hope itself appears to have abandoned us.”

They maintained, however, that “the desolation of the tomb was not the end of the story” and urged “the faithful and all those of goodwill to work and pray ceaselessly for the relief of the countless multitudes throughout the Middle East and beyond who are suffering severely from the ravages of this war”.

“Likewise,” they continued, “we appeal to them to advocate and intercede for an immediate end to the bloodshed and for justice and peace finally to prevail throughout our war-torn region, beginning in Jerusalem and extending to Gaza, Lebanon and all the Holy Land, to the Gulf States and Tehran, and to the ends of the earth.”

In a Palm Sunday meditation delivered in Gethsemane in place of the traditional procession, Cardinal Pizzaballa reflected on the significance of gathering “without palms waving through the streets”.

“This absence is not merely a matter of formalities. It is the war that has interrupted our festive journey, making even the simple joy of following our King difficult,” he said. “Our brothers and sisters of the Holy Land cannot fill the streets this Sunday nor join their voices to the festive procession. Their absence is not empty before the Lord.”

Pizzaballa said the centurion in the gospel – “a man shaped by the logic of force, by a power that imposes himself” – recognises Jesus because “his criteria collapse” before the Crucifixion.

“He discovers that true power lies not in violence or in the sword that kills, but in a life freely given. And so he makes the highest confession: this man is the Son of God (Matthew 27:54). At the very moment when death appears to triumph, truth is revealed, love is manifested and salvation is accomplished.”

The patriarch continued: “Jerusalem, the Holy Land, is not merely a geographical place – it is the beating heart of our faith. Every stone here speaks of salvation, every hill bears the memory of the God who chose to draw near.

“To live faith in this land means to accept the contradiction it embodies: the place of resurrection is also the place of Calvary – the place of God’s embrace is still scarred by too much hatred.”

Enough blood, enough tears – is there any hope for the Holy Land?

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