Pope Francis has cautioned people against adopting a simplistic view of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.
According to the National Catholic Reporter, the pontiff shared his thoughts on the subject during a September 15 meeting with 19 Jesuits working in Russia, Belarus and Kyrgyzstan.
"There is a war underway, and I think it's wrong to think of it like a cowboy movie where there are good guys and bad guys. And it's wrong to think that this is a war between Russia and Ukraine and that's it. No. This is a world war," the Pope said, as quoted by the newspaper.
He also advocated trying to understand the factors that contributed to provoking the conflict in question, remarking that "war is like a marriage, in a sense."
"To understand, you have to investigate the dynamics that developed the conflict," Pope Francis elaborated.
The meeting between the Pope and the Jesuits took place during his visit to Kazakhstan earlier this month, with a transcript of his remarks in Italian released this week by the Jesuit journal La Civiltà Cattolica.