{"id":20409,"date":"2026-06-12T16:50:52","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T11:20:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/pope-leo-tells-human-traffickers-to-repent-or-face-gods-judgment\/"},"modified":"2026-06-12T16:50:52","modified_gmt":"2026-06-12T11:20:52","slug":"pope-leo-tells-human-traffickers-to-repent-or-face-gods-judgment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/pope-leo-tells-human-traffickers-to-repent-or-face-gods-judgment\/","title":{"rendered":"Pope Leo tells human traffickers to &#8216;repent&#8217; or face God\u2019s judgment"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div itemprop=\"articleBody\">\n<p><iframe title=\"Everlit Audio Player\" src=\"https:\/\/everlit.audio\/embeds\/artl_DPOm2ue627K?ui_title_intro=Listen+now%3A&amp;client=wp&amp;client_version=3.1.5\" width=\"100%\" height=\"136px\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>TENERIFE, Spain (RNS) \u2013 Pope Leo XIV issued a stark warning to human traffickers, telling them to \u201crepent\u201d or face the judgment of God, during a speech to charity workers for the integration of migrants on the Spanish island of Tenerife on Friday (June 12).<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI wish to address a clear message to those who take advantage of people\u2019s desperation, to those who organize death routes, traffic in human beings, withhold documents, exploit workers, threaten women, deceive families and turn the suffering of others into a business. Stop. Repent,\u201d Leo said.<\/p>\n<p>The pope said that God hears the suffering of trafficking victims and that the money gained by their exploitations \u201cwill bring neither peace, nor honor, nor a future.\u201d He said traffickers \u201cwill have to appear before divine justice,\u201d urging them to free and make amends to those they harmed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cRepent while there is still time,\u201d he said, \u201cfor God\u2019s mercy can reach even the most hardened sinner, but it enters only through the narrow gate of truth, justice and conversion.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Leo delivered his speech at Plaza del Cristo de La Laguna in Tenerife, one of the eight islands of the Spanish Canaries off the coast of Africa, where he has met and spoken to immigrants, refugees and charity workers.<\/p>\n<p>The Canary Islands are a key stop on the Atlantic route, in which thousands of migrants from West Africa travel to reach Europe each year. While many arrive to the Spanish isles hungry and exhausted, many more die every year in its surrounding waters.<\/p>\n<p>The pope\u2019s message centered on integrating immigrants into society, saying they often face not only literal shipwrecks from the makeshift rafts taking them to Europe, but also the \u201csilent shipwreck\u201d of feeling abandoned in foreign countries and becoming prey to human traffickers. \u201cIntegration means preventing that second shipwreck,\u201d the pope said.<\/p>\n<p>Leo specified that integration doesn\u2019t require migrants to leave behind their identity or be segregated from society. \u201cIntegration is a reciprocal journey,\u201d he said, where those who arrive learn to live in a new land and those who welcome \u201clearn to expand their own homes.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to Catholic, the pope asked that integration doesn\u2019t stop at providing for basic needs but requires also providing a community for migrants. \u201cA human conscience, and even more so a Christian conscience, cannot remain indifferent in the face of these graveyards of the sea, to the victims of shipwrecks and the lack of aid,\u201d Leo said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEvery life lost on these routes is a failure for the human family,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p><!-- CONTENT END 1 -->\n        <\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/religionnews.com\/2026\/06\/12\/pope-leo-tells-human-traffickers-to-repent-or-face-gods-judgment\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>TENERIFE, Spain (RNS) \u2013 Pope Leo XIV issued a stark warning to human traffickers, telling them to \u201crepent\u201d or face the judgment of God, during a speech to charity workers for the integration of migrants on the Spanish island of Tenerife on Friday (June 12). \u201cI wish to address a clear message to those who [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":20410,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20409","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20409","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20409"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20409\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20410"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20409"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20409"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/banitoday.com\/hi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20409"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}