Lasagna, veal and cake were on the menu Sunday as Pope Benedict XVI
invited about 250 poor people to join him for a post-Christmas lunch and
denounced as "absurd" new attacks on the faithful around the globe.
Also
joining the pope and his guests were 250 nuns, seminarians and priests
of Mother Teresa's Missionaries of Charity order, which runs soup
kitchens around Rome.
Last year, Benedict traveled to a Rome soup
kitchen to join the poor for lunch after Christmas.
This year he wanted
to invite them to his home and to pay homage to Mother Teresa, whose
birth centenary is being celebrated this year.
During the lunch,
held inside the Vatican's main audience hall, Benedict told his guests
about the virtues of Mother Teresa, who dedicated her life to serving
the sick and poor.
"To those who ask why Mother Teresa was famous,
the answer is easy: she lived her life in a humble and hidden way, for
the love of God and in love with God," Benedict said.
The feast
included lasagna with homemade Bolognese sauce, veal chunks with roasted
potatoes, traditional yellow Christmas cake with chocolate bits and
Chantilly cream, and coffee.
Before the meal, Benedict delivered
his traditional Sunday blessing from his studio window, denouncing
Christmas Day attacks on the faithful in the Philippines and Nigeria and
a suicide bombing in Pakistan that killed 45 people at an aid center.
"Once again, the earth is stained by blood," he lamented.
A
bomb exploded during Christmas Mass at a police camp chapel in the
southern Philippines, wounding a priest and 10 churchgoers.
Also
Saturday, six people died in attacks by Muslim sect members on two
churches in northern Nigeria.
"I express my heartfelt condolences
to the victims of this absurd violence and once again repeat my appeal
to abandon ways of hatred and find peaceful solutions to conflicts" so
that people can live in peace and security, he said.
Benedict
noted that the Sunday after Christmas traditionally celebrates the
family, taking the birth of Jesus as its cue.
Underlining his rejection
of gay marriage and abortion, the pope stressed that every child
deserves a mother and a father who will love them and welcome them as a
gift.
"This is what gives children security and, as they grow, lets them discover the sense of life," he said.
SIC: AP/INT'L