At 21.15 this evening, the Holy Father Francis presided at the pious exercise of the Via Crucis at the Colosseum, broadcast worldwide.

The texts of the meditations and the prayers proposed this year for the stations of the Good Friday Via Crucis at the Colosseum were entrusted by Pope Francis to Sister Eugenia Bonetti, Consolata Missionary and president of the “Slaves no more” Association. The meditations focused on the suffering of the many people who are victims of human trafficking.

The following is the prayer composed by the Holy Father, which he recited at the end of the Via Crucis:

Prayer of the Holy Father

Lord Jesus, help us to see in Your Cross all the crosses of the world:

the cross of those who hunger for bread and for love;

the cross of those who are alone and abandoned, even by their own children and relatives,

the cross of those who thirst for justice and peace;

the cross of the elderly who bear the weight of the years and of solitude;

the cross of migrants who find doors closed due to fear, and hearts armoured by political calculations;

the cross of the little ones, wounded in their innocence and their purity;

the cross of humanity that wanders in the darkness of uncertainty and in the obscurity of the culture of the momentary;

the cross of families broken by betrayal, by the seductions of the evil one or by murderous lightness and selfishness;

the cross of the consecrated who seek tirelessly to bring Your light in the world and who feel rejected, mocked and humiliated;

the cross of the consecrated who along the way have forgotten their first love;

the cross of your children who, believing in You and seeking to live according to Your word, find themselves marginalized and rejected even by their relatives and peers;

the cross of our weaknesses, of our hypocrisies, of our betrayals, of our sins and of our many broken promises;

the cross of Your Church who, faithful to Your Gospel, struggles to bring Your love even among the baptized themselves;

the cross of the Church, Your bride, who feels continually assailed from within and without;

the cross of our common home that withers gravely before our selfish eyes, blinded by greed and power.

Lord Jesus, revive in us the hope of the resurrection and of Your definitive victory against every evil and every death. Amen!