Pope Francis has appealed for the care of migrants in Bulgaria which has not recently been welcoming of them, but his words during a trip seeking church unity riled a senior cleric in the dominant Orthodox Church in the eastern European nation.

A consistent message of the Pope since the migrant crisis of 2015 has been for the need to welcome refugees, whom he has said been scorned by fear-mongering European nationalists, The New York Times reported as the papal visit began.

“But rarely has he delivered it in a nation that has so few Roman Catholics — they make up less than one percent of the seven million people in a country that is mostly Bulgarian Orthodox,” said the Times, noting that migrants in Italy have also faced hostility.
… Read more » … lire la suite »