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The recent terrorist acts in Vienna and Nice are an attempt to undermine interreligious dialogue and cooperation, Pope Francis said on Wednesday.
During his weekly hearing, Francis said that increasingly cruel forms of terrorism are spreading in Europe, specifically mentioning the attacks in Austria and France.
The leader of the world’s 1.3 billion Catholics called them “deplorable events, which attempt to undermine, with violence and hatred, the fraternal cooperation between religions.”
In Vienna, an attacker launched a shootout on Monday, killing four people and injuring more than 20, in an attack for which the Islamic State claimed responsibility.
Four days earlier, another man killed three people in a Nice church, in what French President Emmanuel Macron described as “an Islamist terrorist attack.”
The pope’s Wednesday hearing was the first in two months to be held without an audience, due to stricter precautions against the corona virus.
In his introductory remarks, Francisco urged people who listen through a video conference to be “very careful” in following the antivirus rules set by politicians and health authorities.
The 83-year-old Pope, however, has surprised by wearing a mask in public. He did not wear one during the audience, held in the library of the Apostolic Palace.
About 10 priests attended, all seated and at a distance.
Source: GNA
