Relatives of Carrickmines fire victims meet Pope

“No one must feel isolated” the Pope continued, and “no one is entitled to trample on the dignity and the rights of others”.

Pope Francis is scheduled to address thousands of Gypsy pilgrims and hundreds of Irish Travellers at an audience in the Vatican this morning – including relatives of the Carrickmines fire victims.

“We no longer want to see family tragedies where children die of cold or in fires”, he said.

“The time has come to uproot centuries-old prejudices, preconceptions and reciprocal diffidence that often are at the base of discrimination, racism and xenophobia”.

The report also spoke specifically of: the changing role of women in families, the church and society; single people and their contributions to the family and the church; the heroic witness of parents who love and care for children with disabilities; the family as a sanctuary protecting the sacredness of human life from conception to natural death; and the particular strain on family life caused by poverty and by migration.

I pray, Francis said, “that Christians will not be forced to abandon Iraq and the Middle East; I think especially of the sons and daughters of your Church, and their rich traditions”.

And the Pope held up the example of the Blessed Zeffirino Giménez Malla as a model of life and religiosity.

And urging those present to avoid giving the media and public opinion occasions to speak badly of Gypsies, he told them to be protagonists of their present and of their future.

The pope said he hoped the upcoming Holy Year of Mercy would be an occasion to let “God’s mercy soothe the wounds of war afflicting the heart of your communities, that no one may feel discouragement in this time when the outcry of violence seems to drown out our heartfelt prayers for peace”.

It is known, he said, that an insufficient level of education of many young Gypsy people represents the main obstacle in entering the world of work.

During the audience in the Vatican’s Paul VI hall, musicians played traditional songs that also reflected the various influences of the native cultures of the lands they live in like, Spain, Ireland and Eastern Europe.