A Shiite cleric on Saturday expressed solidarity with Kurds following Pope Francis’ meetings with Iraqi religious leaders of several faiths.

Jamil al-Rubaie described the meeting between Shiite Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and the Pope as an opportunity to reject sectarianism and racism, claiming that the Shiite city of Najaf is open to various religions and nationalities, especially Kurds.

"Kurds cannot be separated from Iraqi society, especially the Shiites," Rubaie told Rudaw, describing the relationship between the two groups as one of continuity and endearment.

The Shiite Marja has had cordial relations with the Kurdish population of the country since the mid-20th century. The leading Grand Ayatollah Sayyid Muhsin al-Hakim, in 1965 issued a fatwa that barred Iraqi soldiers from conducting warfare against the Kurdish peshmerga during the September Rebellion in the north of the country. The Kurds, during the rebellion, took up arms against the oppressive rule of the central government for 14 years. Mohammad Baqir al-Hakim repeated the Fatwa in 1974.

Pope Francis also met with representatives of multiple religions on Saturday morning in Ur, the birthplace of the Prophet Abraham, the common patriarch of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Continue Reading

An unidentified person on Pope Francis' flight to Iraq delivered a message reportedly from Pope Francis to Israeli President Reuven Rivlin while the Catholic leader was flying over the Jewish state on Friday. 

“Entering Israeli airspace on my apostolic journey to Iraq, I send warm greetings to you, I send warm greetings to you and the people of the nation, praying that Almighty God will bless all with his gift of armory and peace," the person reading the message said in an audio recording released by Rivlin on Saturday, the second day of the Pope's historic trip to Iraq. 

Security has been tight across the various locations Pope Francis has been visiting, where many people hold anti-Israel views.  Continue Reading

President of the Kurdistan Region Nechirvan Barzani has welcomed Prime Minister of Iraq Mustafa al-Kadhimi’s decision to make March 6 as National Day of Tolerance and Coexistence.
 
“I welcome Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi’s declaration of March 6 as the National Day of Tolerance and Coexistence, as historic Papal visit continues in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region,” Barzani said in a tweet on Saturday evening.
 
The second day of the pope’ visit centered on interfaith dialogue. Continue Reading

Iraqi Yarsans (Kakais) on Saturday gave a letter to Pope Francis detailing "the sufferings of religious minorities in disputed areas," according to a community leader. 

Rajab Kakai, a leader of the religious community, was at the reception for the Pontiff in the city of Ur on Saturday morning. 

"We handed his Holiness two letters, one was in the name of the Kakai international community signed by an important Kakayi figure and the other one was in the name of Yarisan Kakai, which highlighted two important points: the suffering and instability of the Kakayi's for being a minority in Nineveh Plains, Kirkuk and Diyala and for his Holiness to lead our officials towards a solution for all the issues we as minorities have been facing," the leader told Shahyan Tahseen after meeting the Pope.

"Both letters share a common ground and it is us asking his Holiness to lead Iraqi officials, politicians and both governments to a solution about the chaos the minorities and Kakayi's are living in," added Kakai.

In Ur, the birthplace of the Prophet Abraham, the common patriarch of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, Pope Francis met with representatives of multiple religions on Saturday morning, appealing to their common history. Continue Reading

My name is Avesta Elias, a 19 year old girl from Ainkawa, Erbil. I’m a Chaldean Catholic, and like many of my people, I can’t wait to welcome the Pope to Erbil. This will be the first papal visit to Iraq in history, and alongside it comes great hope and excitement for Iraqi Christians, a people so incredibly devastated by decades of conflict in a broken, war-torn country.
 
As a community, we are not used to welcoming Christians to Iraq, but rather seeing them leave in droves, shattered from endless persecution by both the government and radical extremists. This visit surely speaks for itself: the leader of the Catholic world visiting a country in which more than 1.3 million Christians have fled since 2003, and to this day, our numbers continue to decrease. 
 
Despite an ongoing global pandemic, large amounts of Christians from all over Iraq are visiting Erbil on Sunday to participate in the mass hosted by the Pope in Franso Hariri Stadium, showing just the sheer significance this visit has on our community. Personally, I am one of many people overjoyed by the visit, impatiently waiting to be a part of the papal mass on Sunday. Also, this visit is a huge win for interfaith coexistence in the region, as the Pope’s commitment could potentially turn the tide, convincing many Christians to return to their ancestral homeland.
 
All in all, I pray that this visit will provide our community the blessings it so desperately needs, and even if this truly is only once in a lifetime, we pray that it blesses our community and promotes real coexistence in this unstable, volatile region for years to come.
 
Personally, I can’t wait to go and celebrate the mass with thousands of other Christians in Franso Hariri Stadium. I remember my relatives traveling to other countries in order to see the Pope up close. Celebrating the mass with the Pope isn’t as simple as it seems, as it is a monumental achievement for all Iraqi Christians, who never expected this event to occur in their lifetimes. The happiness this visit brings to all Iraqi Christians, Catholic or not, is incredible.
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"I think the pope's visit is very important for peace, fraternity, and so that people no longer get killed." Ohannes Gafur Ohanyan, manager of the Surp Gragos Armenian Church Foundation in Diyarbakir (Amed), southeastern Turkey told Rudaw’s Hevidar Zana.  
 
"I think this is very important for them [Christians] to stay in their places, to continue their lives there and not leave for overseas," Gragos said.
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Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi on Saturday declared a national holiday in honour of Pope Francis’ meetings in Najaf and Ur with Iraqi religious leaders and call for fraternity among the country’s diverse population.

“In celebration of the historic meeting in Najaf between Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and Pope Francis, and the historic inter-religious meeting in the ancient city of Ur, we declare March 6 a National Day of Tolerance and Coexistence in Iraq,” tweeted the premier. 

In Ur, the birthplace of the Prophet Abraham, the common patriarch of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, Pope Francis met with representatives of multiple religions on Saturday morning and appealed to their common history.

Earlier in the morning, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the top Shiite cleric who holds tremendous moral authority in Iraq, welcomed the Catholic leader into his humble home in Najaf.

In their meeting that took place without media present, Sistani discussed the global and regional struggles of “injustice, oppression, poverty, religious and ideological persecution, and suppression of basic freedoms and the absence of social justice,” according to a statement from his office. 
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The number of Christians in Iraq has dramatically declined over the years of Iraq’s sectarian conflict and Islamic State group (ISIS) terrorism. Most of those who remain in Iraq, reside in the Kurdistan Region, Kirkuk and Nineveh provinces, according to 2021 data provided to Rudaw by Khaled Jamal, the director of Christian affairs at the Kurdistan Regional Government’s (KRG) Ministry of endowment and religious affairs In 1987, there were 2.4 million Christians in Iraq.

In 2003, when the US-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein, that number had dropped to 1.5 million. Ten years later, after years of sectarian strife, there were just 450,000 Christians remaining in Iraq.

By 2019, after ISIS, there were fewer than 300,000. When ISIS swept into Iraq in 2014, around 138,000 Christians fled into the Kurdistan Region. Some have returned to their homes, but the majority has moved abroad.

The Kurdistan Region has 240 churches and Christian places of worship. Most of Iraq’s remaining Christians are currently residing in the Kurdistan Region, Kirkuk, Mosul, and the Nineveh Plains, according to Jamal.

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In Ur, the birthplace of the Prophet Abraham, the common patriarch of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, Pope Francis met with representatives of multiple religions and appealed to their common history, calling for fraternity and dedication to helping society’s most vulnerable. 

“There will be no peace, as long as our alliances are against others,” said the pope to the gathering of Christians, Muslims, Yazidis, Sabeans, and other Iraqi faiths.

Ur, in Iraq’s Nasiriyah province, is one of the world’s oldest cities. The Bible describes God calling Abraham to leave Ur and settle the land of Canaan. “Brothers and sisters of different religions, here we find ourselves at home,” Pope Francis said. 

“From this place, where faith was born, from the land of our father Abraham, let us affirm that God is merciful and that the greatest blasphemy is to profane his name by hating our brothers and sisters. Hostility, extremism and violence are not born of a religious heart: they are betrayals of religion.”

Nasiriyah has seen some of the bloodiest anti-government protests since 2019 when demonstrators took to the streets demanding improved government services and an end to corruption. A week before the pope’s visit, ten people were killed in Nasiriyah when security forces opened fire on protests.

In November 2003, at least 28 people, including 19 Italians, were killed in Nasiriyah in a bombing of an Italian complex.

The interfaith event began with reading passages from the Bible and Quran about Abraham and Ur and the pope heard personal testimonies from representatives of different faiths. 

Two boys, Daoud and Hassan, a Christian and a Muslim, from Basra recounted how they have grown up together and established a small business. “Though we are not of the same religion, our story shows that we can work together and we can be friends… We don’t want war and violence and hatred. We would like the people of our country to work together and be friends,” said Hassan. 

The pope commended the friendship of the two boys as a model of a way to build the future. 

“It is up to us, today’s humanity, especially those of us, believers in religion, to turn instruments of hatred into instruments of peace,” said Pope Francis. “It is up to us to appeal firmly to the leaders of nations to make increasing proliferation of arms give way to the distribution of food for all. It is up to us to silence mutual accusations, in order to make heard the cry of the oppressed and those who are discarded in our world. All too many people lack food, medicine, education, rights, and dignity. It is up to us to shed light on the shady maneuvers that revolve around money.”

Pope Francis made special mention of the Yazidi community, “which has mourned the deaths of many men and witnessed thousands of women, girls, and children kidnapped, sold as slaves, subjected to physical violence and forced conversions.”

He praised the fraternity of Muslim and Christians in Mosul, working together to rebuild mosques and churches damaged in the war against the Islamic State group (ISIS).

Pope Francis also mentioned Syria, appealing for peace in the neighbouring war-torn country. 

The pope urged people to work together and help each other during the COVID-19 pandemic. “We need each other. The pandemic has made us realize that no one is saved alone,” he said. 
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Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the top Shiite cleric who holds tremendous moral authority in Iraq, welcomed visiting Pope Francis into his humble home in Najaf today, a meeting hailed as a historic moment and a symbol of peace. Sistani thanked the pontiff for “making the effort to travel to Najaf to make this visit.”

In their meeting that took place without media present, Sistani discussed the global and regional struggles of “injustice, oppression, poverty, religious and ideological persecution, and suppression of basic freedoms and the absence of social justice,” according to a statement from his office. 

The cleric "pointed out the role that the great religious and spiritual leaders should play in curbing these tragedies."

Sistani said that Christians, like all citizens of Iraq, must live in “security and peace” and religious authorities have a role to play in “protecting them and the rest of those who had suffered injustice and harm in the past years.”
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Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani rarely meets foreign dignitaries but made an exception for Pope Francis. The purpose of the meeting was to have “talks and understanding between the religions,” Sheikh Jamil al-Rubai, a cleric at the Najaf seminary headed by Sistani, told Rudaw. 

“Hopefully, this visit will bring together Imam al-Sistani and Pope Francis to ensure the denunciation of racism, and sectarianism, and defend justice, and truth, those in need, and a lot of other people,” said Rubai. 

Sistani is also sending a message to Christians, saying “you are part of us,” Rubai added. 

The meeting between Sistani and Pope Francis has now ended and the pontiff is on the way to Nasiriyah. 
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Pope Francis has arrived in Najaf for a meeting with Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. 

White doves were released on his arrival at the narrow alley to Sistani’s house. 

The meeting between the two influential religious leaders is “a profound statement about the importance of tolerance and dialogue in a turbulent region,” wrote Hayder al-Khoei, expert on Iraq and Shia Islam, for NBC.
 
Khoei has met both the pontiff and the Shiite cleric: “I have seen that they both convey calm and humility despite their influence, just as they both embrace a philosophy of tolerance and compassion for the most vulnerable in society. Although the meeting is a brief one, I believe its impact will be felt across the Middle East.”
 
Their meeting will take place away from the media.  Continue Reading

Interfaith dialogue will be on the agenda for the second day of Pope Francis’ visit to Iraq. 

He will begin with meeting Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani in the holy city of Najaf. Iranian-born Sistani, 90, is the highest Shiite authority figure in Iraq. He avoids direct involvement in political affairs, but has expressed solidarity with protesters demanding better public services and an end to corruption. The two will meet away from the press in Sistani’s humble home.

The pope will then visit the ancient city of Ur, believed to be the birthplace of the Prophet Abraham, the common patriarch of the Christian, Muslim, and Jewish faiths. Here, the pontiff will host an interfaith service with Christians, Muslims, Yazidis, Sabeans, and other Iraqi religious minorities. 

The pope will end the day with the celebration of Mass at the Chaldean Cathedral of Saint Joseph in Baghdad. 

 

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