Coronavirus has caused a lot of wrong things this year. European Football Championship, Eurovision Song Contest, Final Exams, Willem Alexander Leave in Greece (more or less), Hugo de Young’s party leader. But one phenomenon cannot be stopped by a pandemic: the speeches of heads of state and world leaders at Christmas.
At noon, the Pope set out with the traditional European-it-European. Not from the usual balcony overlooking St. Peter’s Square, welcomed by thousands of Catholic devotees, but from a hall in the Vatican, attended by only a handful of guests, and surrounded by two Christmas trees, in a papal view.
Of course, Francis has paid a lot of attention to the coronavirus in his speech. But he also referred to another virus: the “Radical Individualism Virus”. And this term was used to criticize rich countries that were believed to store Corona vaccines and pharmaceuticals that did not want to issue patents. According to the Pope, this puts poor and vulnerable countries at a disadvantage.
The Pope stressed that Corona is an international crisis: “I appeal to all heads of state, companies and international organizations to enhance cooperation, not competition, to find a solution for everyone.” Francis also spoke about who should be the first to receive the vaccine, that is, the most vulnerable and needy. Then his speech took a more traditional turn, calling for peace in the war-ravaged regions: Syria, Yemen, Libya, Nagorno Karabakh, South Sudan, Nigeria, Cameroon and Iraq.
