[Grem] Pope Francis in Hungary: European unity ‘crucial’ to peace

[Emoke Greschik]

*Pope Francis in Hungary: European unity ‘crucial’ to peace*

Pope Francis addresses civil authorities and other dignitaries at a former
a Carmelite monastery in Budapest, Hungary, on April 28, 2023, on the first
day of his three-day pilgrimage to the country. | Vatican Media

By Shannon Mullen
<https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/author/668/shannon-mullen>

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/254192/pope-francis-in-hungary-european-unity-crucial-to-peace

[image: What did Pope Francis say to Hungarian President, Katalin
Novák?]  [image:
Hungary Pope | World | reflector.com]

Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Apr 28, 2023 /

Speaking to Hungarian civil authorities in Budapest, “a city of bridges,”
Pope Francis on Friday challenged the nations of Europe to recapture a
spirit of fraternal unity and pursue “creative efforts for peace.”

“In the postwar period, Europe, together with the United Nations, embodied
the noble hope that, by working together for a closer bond between nations,
further conflicts could be avoided,” the pope said April 28 at the start of
his three-day visit to the Hungarian capital.

“In the world in which we presently live, however, that passionate quest of
a politics of community and the strengthening of multilateral relations
seems a wistful memory from a distant past,” the Holy Father lamented.

“We seem to be witnessing the sorry sunset of that choral dream of peace,
as the soloists of war now take over,” he said. “More and more, enthusiasm
for building a peaceful and stable community of nations seems to be
cooling, as zones of influence are marked out, differences accentuated,
nationalism is on the rise, and ever harsher judgments and language are
used in confronting others.”

Before his address, delivered in a former Carmelite monastery in Budapest’s
Castle District, Pope Francis met with Hungary’s President Katalin Novák
and Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, whose conservative policies, many of which
aim to preserve and strengthen the nation’s Christian identity, have placed
Hungary’s government at odds with more liberal members of the European
Union.

In his remarks, the pope made no direct reference to the ongoing war in
Ukraine, Hungary’s neighbor to the northeast. Instead, he spoke broadly of
an urgent need to “generate forms of diplomacy capable of pursuing unity,
not aggravating differences.”

Pope Francis placed Hungary, a historically Christian nation with a rich
tradition of statesmanship, and Budapest itself, forged 150 years ago out
of three separate cities, at the center of this leadership challenge.

“I think of a Europe that is not hostage to its parts, neither falling prey
to self-referential forms of populism nor resorting to a fluid, if not
vapid, ‘supranationalism’ that loses sight of the life of its peoples,” the
pope said. “This is the baneful path taken by those forms of ‘ideological
colonization’ that would cancel differences, as in the case of the
so-called gender theory, or that would place before the reality of life
reductive concepts of freedom, for example by vaunting as progress a
senseless ‘right to abortion,’ which is always a tragic defeat.”

The Holy Father offered a different vision for Europe’s future. “How much
better it would be to build a Europe centered on the human person and on
its peoples, with effective policies for natality and the family — policies
that are pursued attentively in this country — a Europe whose different
nations would form a single family that protects the growth and uniqueness
of each of its members,” he said.

In a sense, the pope said, the city of Budapest symbolizes that vision.

“The most famous bridge in Budapest, the chain bridge
<https://www.budapestinfo.hu/chain-bridge>,” the pope noted, “helps us to
envision that kind of Europe, since it is composed of many great and
diverse links that derive their solidity and strength from being joined
together. In this regard, the Christian faith can be a resource, and
Hungary can act as a ‘bridge builder’ by drawing upon its specific
ecumenical character. Here, different confessions live together without
friction, cooperating respectfully and constructively.”

[image: Pope Francis appears at a welcoming ceremony with Hungary’s
President Katalin Novák (immediate right) and Prime Minister Viktor Orbán
(standing at far right) after arriving in Budapest on April 28, 2023.
Daniel Ibañez/CNA]Pope Francis appears at a welcoming ceremony with
Hungary’s President Katalin Novák (immediate right) and Prime Minister
Viktor Orbán (standing at far right) after arriving in Budapest on April
28, 2023.

Yet Hungary must also confront internal challenges to its historical
character as a welcoming nation, the pope emphasized, alluding to efforts
by Orbán and his party to curtail the flow of refugees from the Middle East
and Africa.

Hungary has welcomed some 1.5 million war refugees from Ukraine since
Russia invaded the country more than a year ago, and the country has been a
global leader in assisting persecuted Christian communities in Syria,
Lebanon, and other parts of the world. While praising those efforts, Pope
Francis also evoked the fraternal spirit of the country’s first king, St.
Stephen <https://www.britannica.com/biography/Stephen-I-king-of-Hungary>,
noting that the 11th-century monarch advised his son, St. Emeric, that
those who brought different languages and customs to Hungary “adorn the
country.”

“The issue of acceptance and welcome is a heated one in our time, and is
surely complex,” the pope acknowledged.

“Nonetheless, for those who are Christians, our basic attitude cannot
differ from that which St. Stephen recommended to his son, having learned
it from Jesus, who identified himself with the stranger needing to be
welcomed,” he continued.

“When we think of Christ present in so many of our brothers and sisters who
flee in desperation from conflicts, poverty and climate change, we feel
bound to confront the problem without excuses and delay. It needs to be
confronted together, as a community, not least because, in the present
situation, its effects will be felt, sooner or later, by all of us,” he
said.

Later on Friday, the pope was scheduled to meet with clergy and pastoral
workers in St. Stephen’s Co-Cathedral in Budapest. His weekend schedule
includes private meetings with his fellow Jesuits and with children from
the Blessed László Batthyány-Strattmann Institute for the Blind. He is also
set to meet with the poor and refugees at St. Elizabeth Hungary Church and
with young adults at the Budapest Sports Arena.







"In this regard, Saint Stephen bequeathed to his son extraordinary words of
fraternity when he told him that those who arrive with different languages
and customs 'adorn the country,'," Francis said, quoting the saint's
command to 'welcome strangers with benevolence and to hold them in esteem'.



In her address to the pope before he spoke, Katalin praised Francis as a
man of peace and urged him to do everything to stop the war on Hungary's
eastern border.



Francis has called for peace Ukraine in nearly every public appearance
since Russia invaded on Feb. 24, 2022 and has said he wants to go to Kyiv
and Moscow in a single peace mission.



Orban has said Hungary and the Vatican are the only two European states
that can be described as "pro-peace".



Hungary supports a sovereign Ukraine but still has strong economic ties to
Russia. Orban's government has refused to send weapons to Ukraine.
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