Denouncing conflicts in Ukraine and Libya, and noting last week's deadly attack against a school in Pakistan, the pontiff also lamented the thousands of victims of the Ebola epidemic in West Africa. "Truly there are so many tears this Christmas," he said.
Delivering his second Christmas blessing, the popular Argentine pontiff, visibly moved and departing from his text, explicitly condemned abortion, deploring the children "killed before seeing the light". Speaking to a large crowd massed outside Saint Peter's Basilica, the pope urged Ukrainians to "overcome tensions, conquer hatred and violence and set out on a new journey of fraternity and reconciliation". He turned too to the violence wrought by Islamic State fundamentalists this year in Syria and Iraq.
He called for peace in "the whole Middle East" and continued efforts towards "dialogue" between Israelis and Palestinians. The pope too urged peace in Nigeria "where more blood is being shed", as well as in Libya, South Sudan, the Central African Republic and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. He noted the victims of Ebola in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea and thanked those who were "courageously" assisting the sick.