Rome, 28 Sept. (LaPresse) – “One cannot speak” of Europe “without mentioning Christianity”. Pope Leo XIV emphasised this whilst speaking in Metz at the meeting ‘At the Roots of Europe for Peace and Unity’. In his address, the Pope recalled the Venerable Robert Schuman, the founding father of Europe. “It is always difficult to define Europe, both in the present and in the past,” the Pope emphasised, before pointing out that it should be understood as “a cultural and historical reality even before being a geographical one”. Speaking on the subject of Europe, he recalled the work of St Benedict, the patron saint of Europe: “Helping the poor, the sick and the elderly; the education of children and universities; hospitals and medicine; architecture and engineering; the development of the sciences; the law and the organisation of cities and states themselves: so many areas in Europe have been profoundly influenced by St Benedict and his monks! Without this monastic tradition, European civilisation as we know it would not exist.”
EU, Pope: “One cannot speak of Europe without mentioning Christianity”
Rome, 28 Sept. (LaPresse) – “One cannot speak” of Europe “without mentioning Christianity”. Pope Leo XIV emphasised this whilst speaking in Metz at the meeting ‘At the Roots of Europe for Peace and Unity’. In his address, the Pope recalled the Venerable Robert Schuman, the founding father of Europe. “It is always difficult to define Europe, both in the present and in the past,” the Pope emphasised, before pointing out that it should be understood as “a cultural and historical reality even before being a geographical one”. Speaking on the subject of Europe, he recalled the work of St Benedict, the patron saint of Europe: “Helping the poor, the sick and the elderly; the education of children and universities; hospitals and medicine; architecture and engineering; the development of the sciences; the law and the organisation of cities and states themselves: so many areas in Europe have been profoundly influenced by St Benedict and his monks! Without this monastic tradition, European civilisation as we know it would not exist.”