Cardinal Mario Zenari—who served as apostolic nuncio in Damascus for 17 years—has warned that the ongoing emigration of Christians constitutes a “grave wound” for Syrian society, noting that 80% of the 1.5 million Christians who lived in the country before the civil war have left Syria in the last decade and a half.
In an interview granted to the Italian Catholic agency SIR, Zenari explained that “unfortunately, others are preparing to leave.” In his view, this mass exodus is particularly painful because Christians have historically played a role as a “bridge” between the country’s different communities.
A devastated country seeking unity
Syria remains, in the cardinal’s words, a “devastated” country that struggles to rebuild its national unity. “The main groups—Sunnis, Kurds, Alawites, Druze, Christians—must regain cohesion. There are still many unknowns here,” he stated.
Following the fall of the Bashar al-Assad regime in December 2024, power in Damascus is in the hands of a transitional Islamist government led by Ahmad al-Shara. According to Zenari, the international community supports this new direction also out of pragmatism: “The new course is also supported because the alternative would be chaos”.
The prelate emphasized that stability cannot depend solely on political agreements. “Syria urgently needs electricity, hospitals, schools, and factories. Development remains the safest path to peace,” he maintained.
Witness during the war
Zenari, 80 years old, was appointed nuncio to Syria in late 2008 and remained in the country during the harshest years of the civil war. In 2016, Pope Francis created him a cardinal in recognition of his fidelity amid the conflict. Last February, Pope Leo XIV accepted his resignation due to age limit from the diplomatic post.
In the interview, the cardinal recalled the faces and names he has carried with him over these years: children mutilated by the war, missing persons, kidnapped priests, including the two Orthodox metropolitans of Aleppo—Yohanna Ibrahim and Boulos Yazigi—and the Jesuit Paolo Dall’Oglio.
“Ambassador for Syria”
Although he is leaving the official post, Zenari assured that he will not detach himself from the country. “Until now I have been ambassador ‘in’ Syria; I want to continue being ambassador ‘for’ Syria,” he declared. His commitment, he said, will continue oriented toward “development, peace, and unity”.
For the cardinal, Syria was for centuries a “mosaic” of peaceful coexistence between ethnicities and religions. “The war has broken that mosaic,” he lamented. His desire is that the country can rebuild that coexistence based on respect and tolerance.
The warning from the Italian prelate highlights a silent but decisive reality: the progressive disappearance of the Christian presence in the Middle East, with consequences that transcend the religious and affect the social and cultural balance of the entire region.