In an Easter message highlighting hope, Pope Francis on Sunday invoked prayers for both the Ukrainian and Russian people, praised nations which welcome refugees and called on Israelis and Palestinians wracked by the latest surge in deadly violence to forge a “climate of trust.” Francis, along with dozens of prelates and tens of thousands of faithful, celebrated Easter Mass in a flower-adorned St. Peter’s Square, affirming the Christian belief that Jesus rose from the dead days after his crucifixion. The 86-year-old pontiff topped the celebration with a traditional speech about troubled places in the world. Encouraging “trust among individuals, peoples and nations," Francis said Easter's joy “illumines the darkness and gloom in which, all too often, our world finds itself enveloped.” The pope's Easter message is known by its Latin name, ”Urbi et Orbi," which means “to the city and the world.” Since Russia invaded neighboring Ukraine in February 2022, Francis has repeatedly called for the fighting to end and sought prayers for the “martyred” Ukrainian people. Ukrainian diplomats have complained that he hasn't come down hard enough in his statements on Russia and particularly Russian President Vladimir Putin as the Vatican tries to avoid alienating Moscow. “Help the beloved Ukrainian people on their journey towards peace, and shed the light of Easter upon the people of Russia,'' Francis implored God in his Easter speech, which he delivered while sitting in a chair on the central balcony of St. Peter's Basilica facing the square. ”Comfort the wounded and all those who have lost loved ones because of the war, and grant that prisoners may return safe and sound to their families." He urged the international community to work to end the war in Ukraine and “all conflict and bloodshed in the world, beginning with Syria, which still awaits peace.” Francis also prayed for those who lost loved ones in an earthquake that struck Syria and Turkey two months ago, claiming tens of thousands of lives. With a renewal in deadly violence affecting both Israelis and Palestinians in recent days, Francis called for a "resumption of dialogue, in a climate of trust and reciprocal respect, between Israelis and Palestinians, so that peace may reign in the Holy City and in the entire region,'' a reference to Jerusalem. But Francis also noted progress on some fronts. “Let us rejoice at the concrete signs of hope that reach us from so many countries, beginning with those that offers assistance and welcome to all fleeing war and poverty," he said, without naming any particular nations. How to care for asylum-seekers, migrants and refugees, and whether to allow them entrance, is a raging political and social debate in much of Europe, as well in the United States and elsewhere. Francis also prayed that national leaders “ensure that no man or woman may encounter discrimination” and that there would be “full respect for human rights and democracy.” With migrants risking their lives in smugglers’ unseaworthy boats in hopes of reaching Europe, the pope lamented that Tunisia's people, particularly the young, struggle with social and economic hardship. In the last two weeks, dozens have died or were left missing after attempting to cross the Mediterranean Sea from Tunisia. The pope included Lebanon and two African countries he visited this year - South Sudan and Congo - among the nations in need of ending divisions and building reconciliation. Speaking about Haiti, he appealed to “political actors and the international community to seek a definitive solution to the many problems that afflict that sorely tried people.” The bloody conflicts cited by Francis contrasted with a riot of bright colors lent by orange-red tulips, yellow sprays of forsythia and daffodils, hyacinths and other colorful seasonal flowers that decorated St. Peter's Square. The blooms were trucked in trucks from the Netherlands. By the end of the pope's appearance, some 100,00 people had flocked to the square in time for the pontiff's speech, according to the Vatican's crowd count. A canopy on the edge of steps on the square sheltered the pontiff, who was back in the public eye for the Mass 12 hours after a 2.25-hour long Easter vigil ceremony in St. Peter’s Basilica the night before. Francis was hospitalized March 29-April 1 for treatment of bronchitis. Still recovering, he skipped the traditional Good Friday procession at Rome’s Colosseum due to unseasonably cold nighttime temperatures. Near the end of the more than two-hour-long Easter Sunday appearance, Francis seemed to run out of steam. His voice grew hoarse and he interrupted his speech at one point to cough. He nonetheless made several laps through the square in the popemobile after the Mass, waving and smiling at cheering well-wishers.

Pope Francis praised Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI’s “acute and gentle thought” as he presided over a packed Wednesday general audience in the Vatican, while thousands of people paid tribute to the former pope on the final day of public viewing in St. Peter’s Basilica. Francis was greeted by an enthusiastic crowd in the Paul VI auditorium and shouts of “Viva il papa!” or “Long live the pope” as he arrived for his weekly catechism appointment with the faithful. This week’s audience was conducted as tens of thousands of people continued to flock to St. Peter’s Basilica to pay their respects before Benedict’s body, lying in state. The first two days of viewing drew a total of 135,000 people. Wednesday’s viewing began before dawn and was set to end in early evening. Francis is due to preside over the late German pope’s funeral on Thursday, an event that is drawing heads of state and royalty despite Benedict’s requests for simplicity and Vatican efforts to keep the first Vatican funeral for an emeritus pope in modern times low-key. Francis drew applause when he opened his remarks by noting all those who were outside paying tribute to Benedict, whom he called a “great master of catechesis.” “His acute and gentle thought was not self-referential, but ecclesial, because he always wanted to accompany us in the encounter with Jesus,” Francis said. Later Wednesday, Vatican officials were to place Benedict’s body in a cypress coffin — the first of three coffins —along with a brief, written summary of his historic papacy, the coins minted during his pontificate and his pallium stoles. Read more: Pope on Christmas: Jesus was poor, so don’t be power-hungry After the funeral, the retired pontiff’s remains will be carried back into the basilica, where the coffin will placed inside a zinc one, and then finally into another made from oak. In keeping with Benedict’s wishes, his remains will be placed in the crypt once occupied by the tomb of St. John Paul II in the grottos underneath the basilica. Benedict, who was elected pope in 2005 following John Paul’s death, became the first pope in six centuries years to resign when he announced in 2013 he no longer had the strength to lead the Catholic Church. After Francis was elected pope, Benedict spent his nearly decade-long retirement in a converted monastery in the Vatican Gardens. “We can’t forget the example that he gave in his resignation, that he more or less said, ‘Look, I’m not in this for the prestige, the power of the office, I’m in it for service, as Jesus taught,’” recalled Cardinal Timothy Dolan, whom Benedict named archbishop of New York in 2009 and cardinal in 2012. Dolan came to Rome for the funeral. Thursday’s rite takes into account the unusual situation in which a reigning pope will preside over a funeral for a retired one, making important changes to a funeral ritual for popes that is highly codified. Two key prayers, from the diocese of Rome and the Eastern rite churches, that were recited during John Paul’s funeral, for example, will be omitted because Benedict wasn’t pope when he died and because both branches of the Catholic Church still have a reigning pope as their leader: Francis. Read more: Did the Pope actually say ‘even nuns watch porn’? While the funeral will be novel, it does has some precedent: In 1802, Pope Pius VII celebrated the funeral in St. Peter’s of his predecessor, Pius VI, who had died in exile in France in 1799 as a prisoner of Napoleon, the Vatican noted Wednesday.

Online pornography viewing poses risks to priests and nuns, according to Pope Francis, who claims that it “weakens the priestly heart.” At a Vatican meeting, the 86-year-old Pope was asked how social media and digital technology should be used, BBC reports. He claimed that pornography was “a vice that so many people have — even priests and nuns.” Read more: Pope blasts Russia's 'infantile' war, EU-Libya deal in Malta “The devil enters from there,” BBC quoted Pope Francis as saying. He advised priests and seminaries to use social media and other aspects of the digital world, but to not spend too much time there. He declared: “The pure heart, the one that Jesus receives every day, cannot receive this pornographic information.” Read more: Pope to UN forum: Hunger is 'crime' violating basic rights “Delete this from your phone, so you will not have temptation in hand,” he urged the group. According to church doctrine, pornography violates chastity.

Pope Francis on Monday decried as criminal the existence of hunger in a world which can produce enough food for all, building on a warning from the chief of the United Nations that climate change and conflict are both a consequence and a driver of poverty and income inequality. Earlier in the day, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told a meeting in Rome via video message that the world’s food system generates a third of all greenhouse gas emissions. That same system is responsible for as much as 80% of biodiversity loss, he lamented in a video message. The gathering was called to help prepare for a U.N. food systems summit to be held in September in New York. In a written message that was read to meeting participants, Francis said the coronavirus ppandemic has “confronted us with the systemic injustices that undermine our unity as a human family.” He said the the world’s poorest people and the planet are crying out because of “the damage we inflict on it through irresponsible use and abuse of the goods God has placed in it.” READ: Pope decries shame of racism, like ‘virus’ lurking in wait The pontiff added that while new technologies are developed to increase the capacity to produce food on Earth, people continue to “exploit nature to the point of sterilization, thus expanding not only external deserts but also internal spiritual deserts.“ Francis called the “scandal” of hunger a ”crime that violates basic human rights.” Earlier this month, a U.N. report noted that up to 161 million more people faced hunger last year compared to 2019, with much of that widened suffering likely linked to the COVID-19 pandemic. “Poverty, income inequality and the high cost of food continue to keep healthy diets out of the reach of some 3 billion people,″ Guterres said. ”Climate change and conflict are both consequences and drivers of this catastrophe.” The summit idea was launched in 2019 months before the coronavirus emerged, but Italian Premier Mario Draghi said the pandemic made existing threats to food security more urgent. Draghi noted in his remarks Monday that the Agricultural Commodity Price Index had jumped by 30% compared to January 2020. The International Fund for Agricultural Development called on decision-makers “to address the failures in food systems” that leave hundreds of millions of people poor and hungry. IFAD is a U.N. agency which aims to help small-scale farming. IFAD appealed for food production which “protects the environment and biodiversity, and where people who produce our food are paid decently for their labor.” In 2020, as many as 811 million people faced hunger, according to the U.N. report earlier this month. READ: Pope visits Iraq's war-ravaged north on last day of tour The chief economist of the Rome-based U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization has said that removing 100 million people from chronic undernourishment would need an additional $14 billion (nearly 12 billion euros) every year until 2030 and nearly triple that amount to achieve the U.N. goal of zero hunger by 2030.

Pope Francis arrived in northern Iraq on Sunday, where he planned to pray in the ruins of churches damaged or destroyed by Islamic State extremists and celebrate an open-air Mass on the last day of the first-ever papal visit to the country.

In Iraq, two decades of back-to-back conflicts have left ancient Christian communities that were once a vibrant and integral part of the landscape scattered and in ruins.

Families that usually reunite on Christmas over a hearty, lingering meal celebrated apart Friday, services shifted online, and gift exchanges were low-key in one of the most unusual and subdued holiday seasons in decades.

Beijing has rejected Pope Francis's criticism of its treatment of the Muslim Uighur minority in Xinjiang.

It’s not exactly divine intervention, but even the pope considers the US presidential race over.

Pope Francis on Saturday made a call to the political leaders to make sure that Covid-19 vaccines are available to the poorest nations.