POPE REDOUBLES PLEAS FOR PEACE IN LEBANON

Castel Gandolfo, Aug. 07 (CWNews.com) - Pope Benedict XVI has stepped up his campaign for an end to the warfare in Lebanon.
At a public audience on Sunday, August 6, the Holy Father spoke of his "bitter frustration that thus far, the pleas for an immediate ceasefire in this martyred region have been ignored."
Pope Benedict repeated his insistence that the faithful have a moral obligation to pray "insistently" for peace in the region. "Let no on shirk his duty!" he said.
"We know quite well that peace is above all a gift of God," the Pope observed, adding that all "men of goodwill" should join in prayer for an end to the fighting. He said that he would "entrust this renewed appeal to the intercession of the most Blessed Virgin.”
The Pope made his appeal during a midday Angelus audience, held at his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo. Speaking on the feast of the Transfiguration, he said that the feast is "like an anticipation of the Paschal mystery," when through his Resurrection Jesus "overcame once and for all the power of the shadow of evil." Christians today, the Pope continued, should "bring that message of hope to the world," reminding everyone that suffering and death are not the final truths of existence, but should be "a passage toward a blessed eternity."
Pope Benedict has commented on the war in Lebanon during every public appearance he has made since the latest round of fighting began. In every case he has decried the killing of innocent civilians in both Israel and Lebanon, called urgently for a ceasefire, and instructed the faithful to join in a campaign of prayer for a lasting peace.