MIA Special Prayer Intention: Tragedy in the Mediterranean

In the wake of the latest tragedy over the weekend in which an estimated 800 refugees (including 60 children) fleeing war and persecution drowned in the Mediterranean, the President of the Commission of the Bishops' Conferences of the European Union (COMECE), Reinhard Cardinal Marx, has issued the following statement-

'“We cannot allow the Mediterranean to become a vast cemetery!” This was the call of Pope Francis to the European States, in his address to the European Parliament in Strasbourg on 25 November 2014, in which he encouraged “mutual support” and warned for the risk of “particularistic solutions”. The tragic drowning of an estimated seven hundred migrants in the waters of the Mediterranean on Saturday night not only recalls the Pope’s appeal but raises questions as to how seriously the European Union considers the values, so often referred to, on which it is founded. The recent disaster in the Mediterranean represents a defeat for everything that makes the European Union a community of values...'

While remembering in prayer the victims of this tragedy, MIA asks the Mercy family to pray that the Heads of State and Government meeting on Thursday will, in the words of Cardinal Marx, 'work to find concrete proposals for the establishment of human asylum and migration policies supported and implemented in solidarity by all member states of the European Union'.

We also ask for continuing prayers for all who set out from the land of their birth, risking everything in search of freedom and a new home, that they will find welcome and safety.

Post your own Prayer or Reflection in our online Chapel

Messages to: Mary Reynolds rsm - Executive Director MIA
 

Image: COMECE