The European Union risks dying, Pope Francis told 27 heads of state from the 28-nation bloc who were visiting Rome on Friday.
They were there for the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome.
The Treaty was the foundation document for what is now the European Union (EU).
“When a body loses its sense of direction and is no longer able to look ahead, it experiences a regression and, in the long run, risks dying,” Francis told them in his Friday address from the Vatican.
He said with Britain quitting the EU and parties like National Front in France and Alternative for Germany (AfD) which reject the EU on the rise, an end to divisions in continental Europe is needed.
He also encouraged the heads of state to welcome refugees and migrants.
In this respect, he noted Europe’s “history has been greatly determined by encounters with other peoples and cultures; hers is, and always has been, a dynamic and multicultural identity.”
At the same time, he warned them not to focus on the refugees and migrants as merely posing “security” problems.
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