Pope Francis: 'Reconciliation is not an abstract word'

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“Reconciliation is not an abstract word” Pope Francis told Colombians on Friday, as he celebrated a Beatification Mass in the town of Villavicencio. He appealed to everyone present to open a door to “every person who has experienced the tragic reality of conflict, because, when victims overcome the temptation to vengeance, they become the most credible protagonists for the process of building peace.”

Villavicencio is seen as a symbolic model for reconciliation. The town, at the heart of an area once besieged by rebels, overwhelmingly backed the President’s peace plan and has taken the step of welcoming back the FARC whose leaders have pleaded for forgiveness and launched a development project.

The two Catholic priests beatified during the Mass: Bishop Jesus Jaramillo and Father Pedro Ramirez, are intimately identified with Colombia’s conflict and provide strong testimonies in a nation in desperate need of forgiveness and healing.

Both of them, Pope Francis said, are “a sign of the expression of a people who wish to rise up out of the swamp of violence and bitterness," a sign of the closeness of the Gospel and of the Church to its people.

Pope Francis’s call to Colombians to overcome what he called the “understandable” temptation of vengeance, is key to the divided country’s reconstruction, as is the inclusion of many groups of victims of the conflict in the government’s plan for a peaceful future.

Some 112 different communities of indigenous people were present at the Mass, together with thousands of victims from all walks of life.

The Pope’s beautiful homily included other key themes for reconciliation including the need to overcome chauvinistic attitudes towards women. Reflecting on the Gospel reading of the day, Francis said it is a powerful commentary of a world in which “psychological, verbal and physical violence towards women is so evident.”

Overcoming that violence, he said, is also key to the sort of full reconciliation that recovery from conflict requires.

Pope Francis went on to call for reconciliation with a “weeping” environment. Villavicencio is described as the 'door to the Colombian Amazon rainforest' - home to many of the displaced or threatened indigenous communities and to the nation’s rich and wonderful natural heritage.

Quoting from his own encyclical 'Laudato Sì' and from a Colombian songwriter he described the trees as weeping witnesses to so many years of violence and said that “the violence present in our hearts, wounded by sin is also reflected in the symptoms of sickness evident in the soil, in water, in air, in all forms of life”.”

Saying “yes” to reconciliation, Pope Francis concluded, means saying “yes” with Mary and singing with her the wonders of the Lord who wishes Colombia to be reconciled: “a promise made also to its descendents forever”.