Pope Leo XIV has urged the United States and Iran to return to talks to end the war and condemned capital punishment, in a wide-ranging press conference en route home from his trip to Africa.
Leo also asserted that countries have the right to control their borders but must not treat migrants worse than “animals”, and lamented that the church’s morality teaching is often reduced to sexual issues.
Leo spoke to reporters aboard his plane. He was leaving after an 11-day, four-nation voyage that took him from Algeria in the north of Africa to Angola in the south and Cameroon in between.
After a trip that was dominated by the very public back and forth between Leo and US President Donald Trump over the war, Leo urged the United States and Iran to return to negotiations.
As a pastor I cannot be in favour of war
He called for a new “culture of peace” to replace the recourse to violence whenever conflicts arise.
He said the question was not whether the Iran regime should change or not.
“The question should be about how to promote the values we believe in without the deaths of so many innocents,” he said.
He revealed that he carries with him the photo of a Muslim Lebanese boy who had been killed in Israel’s recent war with Hezbollah. The boy had been photographed holding a sign welcoming the pope when he visited Lebanon last year.
“As a pastor I cannot be in favour of war,” he told reporters on board his plane.
“I would like to encourage everyone to find responses that come from a culture of peace and not hatred and division.”
Asked if he condemned Iran’s recent executions, Leo said he condemned “all actions that are unjust” and included capital punishment in the list.
“I condemn the taking of people’s lives. I condemn capital punishment. I believe human life is to be respected and that all people from conception to natural (death), their lives should be respected and protected.
“So when a regime, when a country takes decisions which take away the lives of other people unjustly, then obviously that is something that should be condemned,” he said.
Pope Francis changed the church’s social teaching to declare capital punishment immoral in all cases.
Leo affirmed the right of countries to impose immigration controls on their borders and acknowledged that uncontrolled migration had created situations “that are sometimes more unjust in the place where they arrive than from where they left.”
“I personally believe that a state has the right to impose rules for its frontiers,” he said.
“But saying this, I ask: ‘What are we doing in the wealthier countries to change the situation in poorer countries’ to provide opportunities so that people aren’t compelled to leave?”
Regardless, he said migrants are human beings and deserve to be respected in their human dignity and not be treated “worse than house pets, animals.”