In his annual Urbi et Orbi ("To the City and the World") message on Easter Sunday, Pope Benedict XVI called all Christians to a "renewed witness to the resurrection of Christ" and stressed the need of the world "to encounter him and to know him as true God and true man."
To those who have begun to doubt their faith because of all the evil in the world, Pope Benedict presented the example of Saint Thomas the Apostle, who, when told by his fellow apostles that they had seen the Risen Christ, said that he would not believe it until he had touched our Savior's wounds. If those wounds were the source of both St. Thomas's doubt and, when he had seen Christ, his belief, then, Pope Benedict pointed out, the wounded world around us speaks to Christ's "victorious love." In fact, he proclaimed, "by his rising the Lord has not taken away suffering and evil from the world but has vanquished them at their roots by the superabundance of his grace. He has countered the arrogance of evil with the supremacy of his love."
Continuing themes about the damage caused by war that had been stressed by Pope John Paul II before him, the Holy Father recalled the struggles of Christians in Iraq, Lebanon, and throughout the Middle East, who are so often forgotten by their fellow Christians:
In the Middle East, besides some signs of hope in the dialogue between Israel and the Palestinian authority, nothing positive comes from Iraq, torn apart by continual slaughter as the civil population flees. In Lebanon the paralysis of the country's political institutions threatens the role that the country is called to play in the Middle East and puts its future seriously in jeopardy. Finally, I cannot forget the difficulties faced daily by the Christian communities and the exodus of Christians from that blessed land which is the cradle of our faith.
In this Easter season, as we celebrate the Resurrection of Christ, we can follow Pope Benedict's call by praying for peace throughout the world, and especially in the Middle East, that the ancient Christian communities there may continue to survive.
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