Church leaders remember victims of war in Easter messages

The Archbishop of Canterbury and Jerusalem Church leaders have used their Easter messages to recollect all those impacted by war.

In her statement, Archbishop Sarah Mullally, said that the message of the gospel shouldn’t be an abstract hope but a “living reality” that might give strength and luxury to all of humanity, particularly those that are in deep suffering.

She said, “We proclaim it in a world marked by deep suffering and conflict. We consider those living amid war and violence – across the Middle East, in Ukraine, in Sudan, and in so many other places of conflict – and of the churches of the Holy Land, bearing faithful witness under immense strain.

“We remember all who’re displaced, oppressed, or forgotten, and we renew our calling as Christians to face with the marginalised and to serve those most in need.”

She added that Jesus shouldn’t be “distant” from human pain, but took it on himself: “Suffering and pain are penultimate; ultimate is the loving embrace of God in glory. Easter proclaims that even within the darkest places, God is at work bringing life.”

The Bishop of the Diocese of Cyprus and the Gulf, Sean Semple, noted that Easter was happening this 12 months “within the shadow of war” and said that the conflict “wounds our compatriots, livelihoods, political alliances, and creation itself”. 

He said that the cancellation of traditional Easter events in Jerusalem and the indefinite closure of the Holy Sepulchre were “spiritual wounds inflicted on the Christians of the Land of the Holy One, and all pilgrims”. 

In their very own Easter message, the Jerusalem Patriarchs lamented the most recent outbreak of Middle Eastern hostilities as a “relentless cycle of death, destruction and frightful suffering that now ripples across the globe in rising economic hardship”.

However, in addition they reminded the faithful that the core lesson of Easter is that even death shouldn’t be the top, but that “by the ability of God, Christ rose victorious from the grave, bursting the bonds of sin and death”.

The Patriarchs called on Christians in every single place to hope for the relief of those affected by the impact of war, wherever they might be, while Mullally reminded believers to proceed to display the love of Christ of their on a regular basis lives.

“In prayer, in friendship, in hospitality, in shared witness … these small and faithful acts are seeds of a greater harvest, signs of the deeper unity we already share in Christ,” said Mullally.