ANNABA, Algeria — Pope Leo XIV got here to North Africa to honor his religious forefather, St. Augustine, who preached that conflict was solely justified to guard the harmless.
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So maybe it’s becoming the go to has been overshadowed by his escalating feud with Donald Trump over the primary American pontiff’s criticism of the conflict in Iran.
Even when not mentioning Trump instantly, Leo’s remarks throughout this 11-day African journey have been given a unique which means amid his public disagreement with the president.
“God’s coronary heart is torn aside by wars, violence, injustice and lies,” he mentioned Tuesday on a go to to a care house within the Algerian port metropolis of Annaba. “However our Father’s coronary heart will not be with the depraved, the conceited or the proud.”
The pope arrived in Algeria on Monday, the primary go to to the nation by a sitting pontiff.
On Wednesday he was flying to Cameroon, the place separatists introduced a three-day pause in lethal violence to permit Leo secure passage to a “peace assembly” Thursday.
From Cameroon, he’ll go on to Angola and Equatorial Guinea.
The Algerian leg was a spiritual homecoming.
Leo is a member of the Order of St. Augustine, which was based on the teachings of the Fifth-century saint who lived and studied within the Roman metropolis of Hippo, now modern-day Annaba.
Leo took a pilgrimage to these ruins Tuesday, arriving throughout a rainstorm with sharpshooters masking the traditional flagstones and colonnades. He prayed in a tent overlooking its theater, market and basilica the place Augustine preached. And he planted an olive tree and watched as white doves have been launched.
This was meant to be a deeply private, “very particular journey” for the pontiff, as he put it aboard his papal airplane whereas en path to Algeria.
After being chosen on the Vatican Conclave final Might, he declared himself a “son of St. Augustine” and he has visited this pilgrimage website twice earlier than, whereas he was superior of the Augustinian order.
