Pope Francis asked to stop the invasion of Ukraine with a message to Putin: “God, stop Cain's hand!”

Pope Francis delivered today at the end of the general audience a prayer asking for peace for war in Ukraine, following the Russian invasion, which began with: “Forgive us the war, Lord.”

Before the thousands of faithful gathered in the Paul VI Hall for the general audience, the pontiff did not launch an appeal to Ukraine today, but did deliver an exciting prayer written by the archbishop of Naples, Mimmo Battaglia.

“Lord Jesus, born under the bombs of Kiev, have mercy on us! Lord Jesus, who died in the arms of his mother in a bunker in Kharkov, have mercy on us! Lord Jesus, sent twenty years to the front, have mercy on us! Lord Jesus, who still see armed hands in the shadow of your cross, have mercy on us! ”, Francis prayed before the sepulchral silence of the auditorium.

And the prayer continued: “Forgive us Lord, if we do not settle for the nails with which we pierce your hand, we continue to drink the blood of the dead torn by weapons. Forgive us, if these hands you created to protect have become instruments of death.”

“Forgive us, Lord, if we continue to kill our brother, if we continue as Cain removing the stones from our field to kill Abel. Forgive us, if we continue to justify cruelty with our tiredness, if with our pain we legitimize the brutality of our actions”, the pope prayed, before concluding: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, we plead with you! Stop Cain's hand!”

Before holding the audience, the pope also reminded the children fleeing bombs in Ukraine and “who are suffering” and said that they are “victims of the pride of adults”, meeting a group of Italian students before the general audience.

“And now I ask you to think, to reflect: let us think about so many children, boys, girls, who are at war, who are suffering today in Ukraine. They are like you, like you, six, seven, ten, fourteen years old...” , indicated in his greeting at St. Peter's Basilica to the students of the “La Zolla” School in Milan.

“You have a future ahead of you, a certainty of growing up in a society of peace, but these little ones, they have to flee from bombs, they are suffering... with that cold weather,” he added.

(With information from EFE)

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