Pope Leo: Migrants Are “Witnesses of Hope”
Submitted by Marguerite Thompson
(excerpt from vaticannews.com story by Isabella H. de Carvalho)
Pope Leo XIV highlights how migrants and refugees in a special way can become witnesses of hope and tenacity amidst adversity and calls for a future of peace and respect for human dignity, in his Message for the 111th World Day of Migrants and Refugees, released on Friday, July 25.
The Pope explains that migrants and refugees have an important role to play in showing hope in a better future. For the Catholic Church, “the virtue of hope responds to the aspiration to happiness which God has placed in the heart of every man and woman”; and this search is “certainly one of the main motivations” for migrants, refugees and displaced persons, making them “privileged witnesses of hope”.
“Indeed, they demonstrate this daily through their resilience and trust in God, as they face adversity while seeking a future in which they glimpse that integral human development and happiness are possible”, he says, comparing the experience of the people of Israel described in the Bible.
“In a world darkened by war and injustice, even when all seems lost”, he stresses, “their courage and tenacity bear heroic testimony to a faith that sees beyond what our eyes can see and gives them the strength to defy death on the various contemporary migration routes”.