BY Daniel Harkins | September 30 2015 | 
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God builds bridges, Pope says reflecting on US and Cuba visit
Publication Date: 2015-09-30
The Holy Father tells pilgrims during his general audience that the recent Papal visit was a symbolic bridge between the countries
God builds bridges while we build walls, walls which collapse, Pope Francis said today as he recalled his visit to Cuba and the US.
Speaking to pilgrims and tourists in St Peter’s Square, the Pope said he wished to embrace all Cubans without exception, to proclaim the transforming power of God’s mercy, and to renew the hope expressed by St John Paul II that Cuba will open itself to the world and the world to Cuba.
His visit to the US and Cuba was a symbolic bridge, he said, between the two counties, whose half century long, tense relationship recently thawed thanks in part to the Pope’s intervention.
Turning to his US visit, he said he ‘recalled the contribution which America’s tradition of religious freedom has made to the life of the nation.’
He thanked General Secretary Ban Ki-moon for hosting him during his speech to the United Nations in New York, and said the World Meeting of Families in Philadelphia ‘celebrated the beauty of God’s plan for the family, which, as the fruitful covenant between a man and a woman, is the key to a future of authentic prosperity and solidarity for our world.’
Before the general audience, Pope Francis welcomed four hundred disabled and sick people and their four hundred carers from the German branch of the Order of Malta Speaking in the Paul VI Audience Hall, he told his visitors that being ill was very hard, even despite care from doctors and nurses and medicine, but he stressed ‘there is faith’ that encourages us.
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