VATICAN CITY (CNS) ─ Welcoming a group of new ambassadors to the Vatican, Pope Leo XIV told them, "The Holy See will not be a silent bystander to the grave disparities, injustices and fundamental human rights violations in our human and global community."
In a world that is "increasingly more fractured and conflict-prone," he said, the Vatican always will speak up to defend human dignity and peace.
Pope Leo met Dec. 6 with the new ambassadors representing Uzbekistan, Moldova, Bahrain, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Liberia, Thailand, Lesotho, South Africa, Fiji, Micronesia, Latvia and Finland.
All the ambassadors have other assignments as well and do not live in Rome. When the pope accepts the letters of credential of new ambassadors resident in the city, he holds a private meeting with them. Nonresident ambassadors are received as a group, and the pope gives a speech.
The pope told the group that when he greeted the crowds who had gathered at the Vatican for his election May 8, he wanted to share "the greeting of the Risen Lord Jesus -- 'Peace be with you' -- and to invite all peoples to pursue what I have called an 'unarmed and disarming peace.'"
"Peace is not merely the absence of conflict but 'an active and demanding gift,' one that is 'built in the heart and from the heart,'" he told them, quoting from his first speech to the diplomatic corps after his election in May.
Peace, he said, "calls each of us to renounce pride and vindictiveness and to resist the temptation to use words as weapons."
Promoting peace, the pope told the ambassadors, "has become all the more urgent, as geopolitical tension and fragmentation continue to deepen in ways that burden nations and that strain the bonds of the human family."
And the poor are always the first to suffer, he said.
"In my apostolic exhortation 'Dilexi Te,' I echoed the same conviction: that our world cannot afford to avert its gaze from those who are easily rendered invisible by rapid economic and technological change," Pope Leo said.
The pope asked the ambassadors to work with the Holy See in highlighting "the situations of those in need, those who are too often forgotten," and he prayed that "our shared commitment will inspire the international community to lay the foundations for a more just, fraternal and peaceful world."
