Pope urges peace, not politics in call to Russian patriarch

ROME (AP) — The Vatican says Pope Francis has rejected the concept of a ‘just war’ and stressed the need for religious leaders to preach peace in a video call with the head of the Russian Orthodox Church. Wednesday’s call was the first known communication between the two Christian leaders since the start of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. It was all the more remarkable because Francis and Kirill have only met once — at the Havana airport in 2016. That was the first encounter between a pope and Russian patriarch in over 1,000 years. A Vatican statement said both men agreed that the church “must not use the language of politics, but the language of Jesus” and stressed the importance of negotiations to reach a cease-fire.