ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the journeys and challenges taken by Pope Francis on his visits to Auschwitz and Hiroshima. In both he spoke of human solidarity and peace within moments of extreme suffering. Following John XXIII’s seminal statement on peace and the end of nuclear weapons (1963), he spoke of a real peace. For such occasions to be measured it is extremely important to understand the wish of Pope Francis to visit Japan following the path of the first Jesuits into Asia and the Jesuits who helped the wounded in Japan after the use of the atomic bombs at the end of World War II. For Pope Francis, the life of the Jesuit Pedro Arrupe in Japan and the challenge to extermination through force in Japan and Nazi Germany became moments of silence, learning, and peacemaking. His sense of silence during those visits and his learning of human history while visiting became powerful signs of his sense of human and divine peacemaking.
