As thousands of refugees pour into Europe, Pope Francis has called on every parish and religious community to take in one family each.<br /><br /> He said the Vatican state would set the example, with its two parishes each taking in a family of refugees in the coming days.<br /><br /> There are more than 25,000 parishes in Italy alone, and some 12,000 in Germany, where many refugees fleeing war and hardship in the Middle East hope to end up.<br /><br /> “Faced with the tragedy of tens of thousands of refugees, the Gospel calls us and asks us to show solidarity to the most vulnerable and those who have been abandoned — to give them a real hope,” Pope Francis said after his Sunday address in the Vatican.<br /><br /> The crowd in St. Peter’s Square applauded the pontiff, himself the son of Italian emigrants to Argentina, as he said: “Every parish, every religious community, every monastery, every sanctuary of Europe, take in one family.”
