Pope Francis described this year as an Easter of War, speaking to tens of thousands of faithful in St. Peter's Square about the fear and anguish evoked by the conflict in Ukraine, he said that news of suffering in Europe would make people more aware of similar situations elsewhere in the world.
Francis had emerged from two years of the Pandemic, during which he had delivered his Easter message under coronavirus restrictions, even as he acknowledged that the solidarity he had sought as a legacy of the crisis had not prevailed.
The country had been sorely tried by the violence and destruction of the cruel and senseless war into which it was dragged into the country by the events in Ukraine that weighed heavily on the annual address Urbi et Orbi to the City and the World. In those words, applause erupted in the square. The pope said that there should be an end to the flexing of muscles while people are suffering.
Francis suggested that peace was possible, a duty and everyone's primary responsibility, and that people should shout that message from our balconies and in our streets, and for world leaders to heed the call.