A week after massive terrorist attacks in the United States, Pope John Paul II said that believers need not fear the powers of evil and can trust in God's loving protection. “Sooner or later, God takes the side of his faithful, upsetting the tactics of the impious and making them stumble over their own treacherous plans,” he said Sept. 19 during his weekly general audience.
The Pope devoted the session to reflection on Psalm 57, a believer's confident prayer to God for deliverance.
John Paul made no specific reference during the audience to the Sept. 11 attacks, which in previous days he had called “inhuman” and an expression of the “forces of darkness.” But in remarks in English, he told some 12,000 visitors in St. Peter's Square, “I invite you to pray in these days that almighty God will guide the minds and hearts of world leaders so that the ways of justice and peace may prevail.”
(Translation by Zenit and Register)