Pope Francis offered the world an example Saturday by bringing 12 Syrian Muslims back to Italy on his charter plane after a visit to the Greek island of Lesbos.
The group includes three families, six of them children. The Vatican announced they will be supported by the Holy See and cared for by Italy’s Catholic Sant’Egidio Community, which runs a program to grant deserving refugees humanitarian visas to live in Italy while their asylum applications are being processed.
Francis wanted to “make a gesture of welcome” to the refugees, according to the Vatican, after his five-hour visit to Lesbos, where he urged Europe to respond to the migrant crisis “in a way that is worthy of our common humanity.” The island, which sits just off the Turkish coast, has seen hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing war in Syria and Iraq arrive.
“You are not alone,” Francis told refugees in a detention center on the Greek island of Lesbos.
“We hope that the world will heed these scenes of tragic and indeed desperate need, and respond in a way worthy of our common humanity,” Francis said.
His trip came on the heels of a brief meeting between himself and Sen. Bernie Sanders, who took time off from campaigning in New York to speak on income inequality in the Vatican.
