According to the International Rescue Committee, approximately 3,000 unaccompanied children arrived as migrants in Trieste in 2023, a 112% increase from the previous year.
The group says in 2023, they met and provided aid to a total of 16,052 people who arrived at the Trieste train station through the Balkan migratory route. Roughly 68% of the migrants were from Afghanistan.
“Continue to commit yourselves to the front lines to spread the Gospel of hope, especially to those coming from the Balkan route and to all those who, in body or spirit, need encouragement and consolation,” Pope Francis said in his homily July 7.
Earlier in the morning, Francis met briefly with a group of about 150 migrants and people with disabilities.
The pope also remembered prisoners in his reflection. Trieste made headlines earlier this year due to dire overcrowding in the city’s main prison.
“Why do we remain apathetic and indifferent to the injustices of the world?” the pontiff asked. “Why do we not take to heart the plight of prisoners, which even from this city of Trieste rises as a cry of anguish? Why do we not contemplate the miseries, the pain, the discard of so many people in the city? We are afraid, we are afraid to find Christ there.”
At the end of Mass, the pope led those present in praying the Angelus, as he does every Sunday. Before reciting the Marian prayer, he referenced Trieste’s welcome of immigrants.
Trieste “is an open door to migrants — and to all those who struggle the most,” he said.
“Trieste is one of those cities that have the vocation of bringing together different people: first of all because it is a port, it is an important port, and then because it is located at the crossroads between Italy, central Europe, and the Balkans,” Francis noted. “In these situations, the challenge for the ecclesial and civil communities is to know how to combine openness and stability, welcome and identity.”
After Mass and the Angelus, Pope Francis boarded a helicopter for the Vatican from the nearby Audace Pier. He arrived at the Vatican just before 2 p.m., according to the Holy See Press Office.
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Hannah Brockhaus is Catholic News Agency’s senior Rome correspondent. She grew up in Omaha, Nebraska, and has a degree in English from Truman State University in Missouri.
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