If this pontiff were actually a Christian rather than a socialist pacifist who "borrows" biblical rhetoric and imagery for his godless ideological ends, I would - I think - get where he was coming from with this Easter pronouncement. Romans 12:19 summarizes it succinctly:
Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, “Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,” says the LORD.
And so He will. Not in the way, or as quickly, as you wanted, necessarily, but the payback will come - hence the t-shirt I saw one time that on the front said, "JESUS IS COMING...." and on the back said, "....AND IS HE PISSED!". And sometimes the wrong lies in our vengefulness being unjustified and it's our attitudes that need adjusting. Which is one more reason why anger and resentment a successful political motivation doth not make, and are an even worse and unhealthier lifestyle.
But this is in the context of interpersonal relationships, not the affairs of nations and clashes of civilizations. In war, soldiers of opposing nations and factions don't fight each other out of personal animus - they've never personally seen or met each other before, and with modern weaponry will probably never come into close quarters hand-to-hand combat - but to stay, and keep their buddies, alive, and employ the martial golden rule: "Do it unto them before they can do it unto us".
Which brings us to Romans 13:3-4:
For rulers are not a cause of fear for good behavior, but for evil. Do you want to have no fear of authority? Do what is good and you will have praise from the same; for it is a minister of God to you for good. But if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword for nothing; for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil. [emphases added]
Avengers also have repulsor weapons, gamma ray-fueled metamorphoses, vibranium shields, and degenerate-matter-powered hammers. Nowhere on that list do I find the line-item, "weapons of love":
Pope Francis urged the world in his Easter message on Sunday to use the "weapons of love" to combat the evil of "blind and brutal violence", following the attacks in Brussels.
After a week of sombre religious events commemorating Jesus' death [and resurrection], Francis said an Easter Sunday Mass under tight security for tens of thousands of people in a sun-drenched St. Peter's Square. [emphasis added]
Does anybody think that "tight security" was armed with French ticklers? I'm guessing no.
Afterwards, in his traditional, twice-yearly Urbi et Orbi (to the city and the world) message, he spoke of violence, injustice and threats to peace in many parts of the world.
It would be more accurate to describe it as the wars in all the parts of the world from which "peace" has been taken.
"May He (the risen Jesus) draw us closer on this Easter feast to the victims of terrorism, that blind and brutal form of violence which continues to shed blood in different parts of the world," he said, speaking from the central balcony of St. Peter's Basilica.
C'mon, your popiness, you can say "jihad". It's not a sin.
He mentioned recent attacks in Belgium, where at least thirty-one people were killed by Islami[c Fundamentalist]s, as well as those in Turkey, Nigeria, Chad, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, and Iraq.
"With the weapons of love, God has defeated selfishness and death," the leader of the world's 1.2 billion Roman Catholics said from the same balcony from where he first appeared to the world on the night of his election on March 13th, 2013.
Christ defeated sin and death on the cross of Calvary, which was just again commemorated two days ago. He did that by submitting to the terrorism inflicted upon him by the Sanhedrin and Israel's Roman occupiers because His mission in His First Coming was to pay the penalty for all sin for all time by suffering His own just wrath against it in humanity's place, so that all who accept that free gift will and can be forgiven for their own sins, and He will be legally entitled to judge and condemn those who reject it to the eternal damnation from which He provided them an escape. That victory was confirmed on the day we commemorate today.
When Messiah Jesus returns the next time, it will be to bring the world into submission to Him, and He won't be using "weapons of love". Why I, a guy sitting in his living room 9,109 miles away with no flowing white robes and a much better hat, armed with nothing except a Bible, the illumination of the Holy Spirit, and literacy, should be needed to edit the Roman Catholic pontiff's speeches after the fact for their chronic scriptural errors should tell you just what was in the little plume of white smoke that puffed forth from the College of Cardinals cottage three years ago.
And, of course, Jorge couldn't resist contradicting all the pious condemnations he'd just gotten through mouthing by reiterating his obtusity about one of the prime sources of the "evil" that is overrunning Europe:
He urged Europe "not to forget those men and women seeking a better future, an ever more numerous throng of migrants and refugees - including many children - fleeing from war, hunger, poverty and social injustice."
Because the Pope isn't Catholic?
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