AMMAN,
Jordan — Pope Francis called “urgently” on Saturday for a “peaceful
solution” to the Syrian crisis and a “just solution” to the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict, as he started a three-day sojourn through
the Holy Land at a time of regional turmoil and tension.
Reiterating
a theme of his 15-month-old papacy, Francis praised Jordan for
providing a “generous welcome” to refugees from “neighboring Syria,
ravaged by a conflict which has lasted all too long.” He expressed “deep
regret” for the “continuing grave tensions in the Middle East,” and,
detouring from his prepared remarks, said, “May God protect us from the
fear of change.”
The
pope spoke to about 200 invited guests – many of them Christian
dignitaries in elaborate costume – at the royal palace at an afternoon
welcome ceremony. King Abdullah II told the pope his “humanity and
wisdom can make a special contribution” to helping Jordan and other
countries where Syrian refugees have settled, as well as in the
Israeli-Palestinian arena.
“The
status quo of justice denied to the Palestinians, fear of the other,
fear of change – these are the way to mutual ruin, not mutual respect,”
the king said. “Together, we can help leaders on both sides take the
courageous steps needed, for peace, justice and coexistence.”
Abdullah
spoke repeatedly about the collaborations and historic connections
between Muslims and Christians, saying that they are neighbors and that
they together make up “more than half of humanity.” He did not mention
Jews. The pontiff, in contrast, spoke about all three monotheistic
religions, calling Jordan a “land so rich in history and with such great
religious significance for Judaism, Christianity and Islam.”
Francis
is the fourth pope to visit the Holy Land, making what he described as a
“strictly religious” pilgrimage that is focused on a meeting Sunday
with the Patriarch of Constantinople to mark the 50th anniversary of a
historic Catholic-Orthodox reconciliation. But the itinerary is laced with political minefields, particularly given last month’s collapse of Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations and the raging Syrian civil war.
On
Sunday morning, Francis is to become the first pope to travel directly
from Jordan to the Israeli-occupied West Bank. He will meet President
Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority as a peer head of state,
underscoring the Vatican’s support for the 2012 United Nations
resolution upgrading the Palestinians’ status. Palestinians have
trumpeted the visit to the “State of Palestine,” as the Vatican website
also describes it, and will use Francis’s time in Bethlehem to highlight
hardships under Israeli occupation.
Francis
will also be the first pontiff to lay a wreath on the grave of Theodore
Herzl, the father of modern Zionism, a boon to Israelis more than a
century after Pope Pius X harshly rejected
Herzl’s appeal for support. And on Monday, he is to say Mass on Mount
Zion, claimed as both the site of the Last Supper and the tomb of King
David, a plan that has ignited anti-Christian graffiti and protests from
religious Jews.
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Here
in Jordan, where the pope had his largest public audience about 15,000
people attending a two-hour Mass at a soccer stadium — the landscape is
less fraught. The palace hopes the visit will focus the world’s
attention on the influx of more than 600,000 Syrian war refugees, which
has overwhelmed Jordanian cities and strained water, health and
educational resources. Jordan is also counting on his sunset prayers at
Bethany Beyond the Jordan, where some believe Jesus was baptized, to
help a lagging tourism industry.
About
90,000 pilgrims visited Bethany last year, compared with 430,000 who
stopped at an Israeli park on the other side of Jordan River that offers
a rival claim
as the baptism site described in the New Testament. Francis is the
third pope to visit Bethany, and the Jordanians are promoting a website filled with biblical, archaeological and other evidence that theirs is the authentic spot.
The
trip is both a showcase and a test for Francis, 77, who has so far
thrilled the faithful with his humility, warmth and disregard for
Vatican formality. His popularity began practically before the white
smoke declaring his election had cleared, when he greeted throngs in St.
Peter’s Square with a simple “good evening.” He has shunned gilded
vestments and fancy shoes, flummoxed guardians of Vatican protocol with
off-the-cuff remarks and impromptu personal phone calls. He lives in
modest quarters and on this trip refused armored vehicles and brought a
trimmed-down entourage.
Francis,
who chose his name to focus attention on the plight of the poor,
shocked the Roman Catholic world with a September interview in which he
said the church had grown “obsessed” with abortion, same-sex marriage
and contraception. While he has not changed church doctrine, he has
transformed the tone, asking, “Who am I to judge?” regarding
homosexuality.
Refugees have been a particular concern of the pope. His first official trip was to the tiny Mediterranean island of Lampedusa,
a gateway to Europe for thousands of desperate asylum seekers. He later
suggested empty church buildings could house refugees, and visited a
Rome refugee center, where he spoke with a Syrian family.
Francis,
who was scheduled to meet Saturday evening with several hundred refugee
children from Syria and Iraq, has decried the “globalization of
indifference” to the humanitarian crisis in and around Syria, but also
refused to resign himself to the flight of Christians from the Middle
East.
Shamon
Bahnan, who fled Syria with his wife and son in October and has been
staying at a church in downtown Amman, welcomed the pope’s visit but
worried that he might publicly urge Christians to stay in the region.
“That
will ruin it for us,” said Mr. Bahnan, 60, who hopes to emigrate to
Sweden or Belgium. “European countries will close their doors on us. I
can’t stay living in these conditions and I can’t go back.”
At
the stadium in Amman, thousands of refugees, Jordanians, and pilgrims
from Europe listened to Christian music as they awaited the pontiff’s
arrival on a stage festooned in yellow and white fabric, the Vatican
colors. Some 1,200 schoolchildren were to take their first communion,
including Jude Handal, 10, who said, “the Pope is the King of all
Christians.” Francesca Osbaldeston, 64, a retired teacher, said she and a
friend had traveled from England “to tell the Christians of the Middle
East we haven’t forgotten them.”
Juliana
Muni, 27, an Iraqi Chaldean who came to Jordan six months ago with her
three children, said, “Christians are the first to pay the price of
instability.”