Pope Francis has urged Italians to help migrants as voting proceeded in a general election widely expected to bring an anti-immigration rightwing coalition into power.
Speaking at the end of an open-air mass in the southern Italian city of Matera, the pope recalled that Sunday coincided with the Catholic church’s World Day of Migrants and Refugees. “Migrants are to be welcomed, accompanied, promoted and integrated,” he told the assembled faithful.
“Let us renew our commitment to building the future in accordance with God’s plan: a future in which migrants and refugees may live in peace and with dignity.”
Francis made no direct reference to the election, but his message rang loud and clear throughout the country as millions of Italians queued to elect a new government.
Migration has been a central theme in the electoral campaign of extreme right parties, led by the leader of Brothers of Italy, Giorgia Meloni, who could become the country’s first far-right leader since Mussolini and who once said Italians needed to “repatriate the migrants back to their countries and then sink the boats that rescued them”.
This summer, Meloni and another of her coalition leaders, Matteo Salvini, a former interior minister who made high-profile moves to block the arrival of asylum seekers at Italian ports, have rallied against what they described as fake refugees and portrayed the arrival of people seeking asylum in Italy as an “invasion”.
Meloni, whose party has roots in neo-fascism, said that if she becomes prime minister, she intends to put in place a naval blockade in the Mediterranean to stop migration to Italy.
“May the Kingdom of God be realised with them, without exclusion,” said the pope. “And we can thank these ‘brothers and sisters’ as they can help our communities grow and flourish economically, culturally and spiritually.”
It is not the first time the pope has criticised far-right parties and their anti-migration stances. Francis has previously criticised former US president Donald Trump and the “new culture of defending territories by building walls”, which has “brought so many headaches and so much suffering”. He has also urged Hungary to “extend its arms towards everyone” in an apparent veiled criticism of Viktor Orbán’s anti-migrant policies.
Last year, returning from a visit to Lesbos, the Greek island long at the centre of Europe’s refugee crisis, Francis attacked Europe, citing its indifference and cynical disregard while people continue to die during sea crossings.
On Sunday, Francis also asked Italians to have more children. “I’d like to ask Italy: more births, more children,” he said. Italy has one of the lowest birthrates in the world and Francis has frequently lamented its “demographic winter”.
The 85-year-old Francis appeared tired during the visit, which was scheduled before Italy’s snap elections were called and came a day after he made a separate trip to the Umbrian hilltop town of Assisi. Francis has been using a cane and a wheelchair this year due to strained knee ligaments that make walking and standing difficult.
