As reported by Vatican News today, at the Basilica of Saint Nicholas in Bari, in southern Italy, Cardinal Matteo Zuppi, president of the Italian Bishops Conference, spoke yesterday at a vigil organized by the Conference and the Archdiocese of Bari-Bitonto to call for an end to violence in Ukraine. He urged that a conference be convened, “like Helsinki, that could resolve many conflicts and lay the basis for peaceful coexistence.”
Saint Nicholas, he said, “doesn’t want violence and orders peace! Let no one say that the conditions don’t exist. They can be found! Enough of combat that only leads to destruction! Peace isn’t a dream, it’s the only way to live. It is `the’ choice, not `a’ choice.
In his homily, he called for a Christmas truce, as Secretary of State Cardinal Pietro Parolin had, and for a commitment to organize “a conference which, as so wisely took place in Helsinki too many years ago, can resolve so many conflicts and create the bases for peaceful coexistence.”
The Basilica of Saint Nicholas was an appropriate site for Cardinal Zuppi’s call for peace, as it is an ecumenical center which attracts pilgrims from many different religions, including Orthodox Christians. In 1966, at one end of the crypt which holds the relics of Saint Nicholas, an Orthodox chapel was built, but the Dominican friars who live in a community at the Basilica, maintain the vision that Saint Nicholas is everyone’s saint who brings together Christians of many different expressions from East and West.
In 2018, Pope Francis invited religious leaders from all the Middle Eastern denominations to meet at Bari to pray for peace in the Middle East and peace in Syria. Bari was chosen because it represents a “window into the East” and because it is home to the relics of Saint Nicholas, who is venerated by Christians of the East and West alike. (https://www.stnicholascenter.org/who-is-st-nicholas/saint-in-bari )
