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Pope: 'Peace is possible'
VATICAN CITY -- Pope John Paul II has greeted 2003 with a renewed call for peace in the world, including an end to the "fratricidal and senseless" conflict in the Middle East. In his annual New Year's Day Mass, the pope repeated themes from his other recent public pronouncements, including a Christmas Day message in which he urged world leaders to avoid war in Iraq. He told the crowd gathered for Mass in St. Peter's Basilica on Wednesday: "Despite the serious and repeated attacks to the serene and joint cohabitation off peoples, peace is possible and right. "Indeed, peace is the most precious good to invoke from God and to build with every effort." Of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he said: "The dramatic and persistent tensions that the Middle East region finds itself in makes all the more urgent the search for a positive solution to the fratricidal and senseless conflict, which for too long has bloodied it. "There must be co-operation of all who believe in God, knowing that authentic religiousness -- far from placing individuals and peoples in conflict with one another -- rather pushes them to together build a world of peace." The 82-year-old pontiff, who was later was to issue his traditional New Year's Day greeting in dozens of languages, did not specifically refer to Iraq. But he spoke generally in his homily of the conflicts of the day and "threatening tensions of the moment." "Yet again I invite prayer to pursue pacific means for settlement," the pope said. A week ago, in his Christmas Day address, the ailing pontiff had urged the world to avoid war and said efforts for peace were urgently needed "in the Middle East, to extinguish the ominous smouldering of a conflict which, with the joint efforts of all, can be avoided." The Vatican newspaper offered a reminder of the Vatican's increasing opposition to a war with Iraq in its New Year's Day edition.
Under the headline, "There is no alternative to peace," the newspaper said in a front-page editorial: "A perverse mentality of war, terrorism, domination and blood throws a menacing shadow of sadness on the dawn of the new year." During his traditional New Year's Eve homily, the pope gave thanks for the last 12 months. "This evening, at the contemplation of the mystery of the divine maternity of the Virgin Mary, we join in a hymn of gratitude for the year 2002, while we face on the horizon the history of 2003," he said. "Let us thank God from the depth of our hearts for all the benefits He generously gave us during these past 12 months." The pontiff cited among the year's high points "the generous response of so many young people to the Christian proposal" and he praised "significant steps in the not-easy ecumenical walk."
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