Pope urges Hungary to open doors in final mass
Budapest, Apr 30 (EFE).- Pope Francis urged Hungarians not to close doors to migrants and foreigners on Sunday during the third and final day of a visit focusing on the war in Ukraine.
Around 50,000 people flocked to Francis’s outdoor mass in Budapest’s Kossuth Lajos square, located behind the Hungarian parliament. Among them were Hungarian president Katalin Novak and nationalist prime minister Viktor Orban who maintains hardline migration policies.
“Please, let us open those doors! Let us try to be, in our words, deeds, and daily activities, like Jesus, an open door, a door that is never shut in anyone’s face, a door that enables everyone to enter and experience the beauty of God’s love,” the pontiff said.
In his homily, Francis called for opening doors to “other people… to the world… to those who are irregular… those who long for God’s forgiveness.”
The 86-year-old added it “hurts” to see the closed doors of “our individualism amid a society of growing isolation,” referring to the barbed-wire fence Hungary installed to keep migrants from entering the the country via the Balkan route out.
“The closed doors of our indifference towards the underprivileged and those who suffer; the doors we close towards those who are foreign or unlike us, towards migrants or the poor,” he added.
The Argentine pope also urged bishops, priests, faithful and political and social leaders to be “open and inclusive… and in this way, help Hungary to grow in fraternity, which is the path of peace.”
Francis arrived in Hungary on Friday and is expected to return to Rome after a speech to the academic world on Sunday.EFE
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