Pope Urges Believers to Treat Foreigners with Kindness

Pope Leo has urged the Christians world-wide to help those in need and treat foreigners with kindness, in a message while closing the Catholic Church’s Holy Year on Tuesday in St Peter’s Basilica.

The pope said, “Around us, a distorted economy tries to profit from everything. After this year, will we be better able to recognise a pilgrim in the visitor, a seeker in the stranger, a neighbour in the foreigner?"

A Holy Year of the Church occurs in 25 years, and is considered a special year of forgiveness of sins and also the punishment due to sin, it is a year of reconciliation between adversaries, of conversion and receiving the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

The first Roman Catholic Holy Year is believed to have been instigated by Pope Boniface in the year 1300.