He said Pope Leo On the 14th anniversary of migrants at a reception center on the Spanish island of Tenerife on Friday, “We are all migrants,” at the end of a week-long visit to… Spain It highlighted the suffering of irregular immigrants.
Tenerife is one of them Canary Islands in Atlantic OceanIt has become a gateway for tens of thousands of irregular immigrants searching for a better life in Europe.
The head of the Catholic Church, which includes 1.4 billion believers around the world, ends his trip by calling for more assistance to migrants and taking measures to combat human trafficking, at a time when it remains an issue. Immigration It is a hot topic in political debate.
“We are all, in one way or another, migrants, and we are all pilgrims on our way to the heavenly homeland,” he said in a speech to hundreds of migrants at Las Raices (Roots), a center located in a former military barracks that was initially severely criticized for overcrowding.
“Let’s help each other to make this journey a more humane place for everyone,” he added.
Pope Leo (AFP).
During a meeting with organizations working with immigrants in Tenerife, the Pope considered that the integration of immigrants is a “mutual journey” between host communities and new arrivals, while he urged immigrants to learn the language of the host country, “respect its laws,” and “get to know its customs.”
He is expected to hold an open-air mass in the port of Santa Cruz de Tenerife in front of tens of thousands of people.
After visiting Madrid andBarcelona Earlier in the week, the Pope arrived on the island of Gran Canaria in the archipelago on Thursday.
He condemned the “indifference” towards migrants and threw a wreath into the sea at the port of Arguineguin in memory of the thousands of migrants who died trying to reach the Canary Islands.
“Human dignity does not carry a passport,” he said from the dock before blessing a blue cross made from the wood of a boat on which migrants had arrived.
“Monsters lurk in these seas…criminal networks that exploit desperation, human traffickers who enslave women and children, and those whose indifference allows the poor to be swallowed up in a cycle of exploitation or oblivion,” he added.
The Supreme Pontiff said, “Europe cannot claim to defend human dignity, while it has become accustomed to the transformation of the Mediterranean and the Atlantic into unmarked graves.”
He added that this tragedy should “awaken the conscience” of countries of origin and transit, where migrants flee poverty and conflict and fall prey to human trafficking networks.
From Tenerife, the Pope will fly to… RomeHe is expected to speak to journalists on board the plane.
On July 4, he is scheduled to visit the Italian island of Lampedusa, one of the most prominent points of arrival for migrants to Europe, in a move that confirms that the issue of migrants constitutes one of the basic pillars of his pontificate.
