It is not possible to describe the suffering of the Syrian people with human words. The only effective description of the southern country is the following: “Whoever doesn’t believe in Hell, suffice it for him to go there and he will realize what Hell is,” said Cardinal Mario Zenari, Apostolic Nuncio in Damascus, who last Saturday, March 25, 2017, celebrated a Mass in the Roman parish of Santa Maria delle Grazie alle Fornaci, of which he took possession.
In his homily, the Cardinal turned his thought to martyred Syria: 400,000 dead; two million wounded, among whom many are mutilated; about five million refugees in countries outside of Syria; more than six million internally displaced; more than 600,000 besieged without the possibility of access to humanitarian aid. Thousands of children dead under the bombardments: wounded, mutilated, lacerated in body and in spirit – a real and proper slaughter of innocents.”
Cardinal Zenari stressed that the “Pope is constantly “ kept up to date on what is happening in Syria, and he would like to visit the country, but there are too many risks. “He is ready to come, but the issue is that he can’t unless there is a minimum of security, be it for him and especially for the people, because if the Pope comes to Syria he can’t stay in the Nunciature: he must meet the people, he must meet the crowds,” said the Cardinal.
“I don’t know how to describe this atrocity,” he continued. And he proffered a phrase that renders well the idea: “Whoever doesn’t believe in Hell, suffice it for him to go there and he will realize what Hell is.”
Hence, his appeal: “Public opinion must exert pressure on several governments, because a great danger is that, little by little, these tragedies will be forgotten.”
