The head of the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC), Patriarch Porfirije, dedicated a part of his Christmas message to the tragedy in Novi Sad, where 15 people died in the collapse of a canopy at the railway station, and two were seriously injured, calling on today’s quarreling brothers to embrace each other, following the example of Saint Sava, to bring peace to the country.
“We prayerfully cry out to God to take the innocent victims of the collapse of the canopy at the Novi Sad railway station into His embrace. We look into our hearts and look at each other, praying to the Lord to give us the strength to constantly draw a warning lesson from this tragic event, but also from other mentioned and unmentioned events, in the country and the world, about the fact that we must be brothers to each other, be human, Christlike, sincere, fundamentally good,” said Patriarch Porfirije, previously mentioning the suffering in the Middle East and the war in Ukraine.
Recalling that 2025 marks the 850th anniversary of the birth of Saint Sava, Patriarch Porfirije said that the SPC is “deeply concerned about the current events in our people” and that the reconciliation of quarreling brothers carried out by this saint is a valuable lesson for this year.
“For reconciliation, not only his prayer and his effort were enough, although without them it would not have been possible. It was also necessary for both brothers to extend their hands to each other, to embrace and forgive each other. That was the only true, evangelical way to achieve peace among brothers, in the state and among the people. Saint Sava, inspired by the Gospel of Christ, showed this and left us as a legacy a model of churchly reconciliation,” said Patriarch Porfirije, adding that “the Church does not make distinctions between brothers.”
According to him, “a multitude of misfortunes, conflicts, and wars begin with the dehumanization of one’s neighbor, the erasure of the humanity of the other human being,” so “it is of crucial importance that all of us, as many as there are, stop using language in which the other is first called a stranger, then an opponent, then an enemy, and finally, an inhuman being.”
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“Therefore, brothers and sisters, wherever we live, let us bridge the gaps between us, listen to each other, respect each other’s views and opinions, especially when they are different from ours. Let us abandon aggression and violence as a way of resolving problems and disagreements,” said Patriarch Porfirije.
In the part of the message dedicated to Kosovo and Metohija, Patriarch Porfirije said that “the Serbian people in this, their centuries-old homeland, have been the most endangered and unprotected people on the European continent for a quarter of a century.”
“Exposed to pressure, arrests, forcible seizure of municipal self-governments, the closure of local health services, the seizure of land and other private property, the destruction of cemeteries and cultural monuments, they are constantly intimidated and persecuted,” enumerated Patriarch Porfirije.
“We look at you, our brothers and sisters in Kosovo and Metohija, with love, respect, and gratitude, and admire your faith, your courage, your patience, and your endurance,” he said.
“Just as we believe in the words of the Lord that ‘blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled,’ so too do we believe that the day will dawn when for you and for all our people ‘the Sun of righteousness, Christ our God, will shine’ and that you too will be filled with His righteousness,” said Patriarch Porfirije.
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