Iraqi and Palestinian Christians seek an end to violence

-28/12/05

Christians in Iraq


Iraqi and Palestinian Christians seek an end to violence

-28/12/05

Christians in Iraq and in Palestine have marked the Christmas season by condemning indescriminate violence, calling for peace, and seeking to build relations between faith communities.

Ceremonies in Baghdad were held before dusk on Saturday in advance of a curfew.

“I do not want to make a distinction between Christians and Muslims, we are all Iraqis,” said Emmanuel II Delly, head of the Chaldean Church.

“A car bomb kills without distinguishing between Christians and Muslims.”

In Bethlehem, revered as the birthplace of Jesus, Latin Patriarch Michel Sabbah, the senior Catholic cleric in the Holy Land, said the region was “thirsting for peace”.

“God created you not to fear or to kill each other but to love each other, to build and to cooperate together,” he told crowds in Bethlehem, where Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas was attending his first Christmas Eve service.


Iraqi and Palestinian Christians seek an end to violence

-28/12/05

Christians in Iraq and in Palestine have marked the Christmas season by condemning indescriminate violence, calling for peace, and seeking to build relations between faith communities.

Ceremonies in Baghdad were held before dusk on Saturday in advance of a curfew.

“I do not want to make a distinction between Christians and Muslims, we are all Iraqis,” said Emmanuel II Delly, head of the Chaldean Church.

“A car bomb kills without distinguishing between Christians and Muslims.”

In Bethlehem, revered as the birthplace of Jesus, Latin Patriarch Michel Sabbah, the senior Catholic cleric in the Holy Land, said the region was “thirsting for peace”.

“God created you not to fear or to kill each other but to love each other, to build and to cooperate together,” he told crowds in Bethlehem, where Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas was attending his first Christmas Eve service.