It is time for the world to step in and confront the extremist ideology of Islamic State, the region's Christian leaders said this week.
Middle East patriarches who met on Monday in Damascus, Syria called for a culture of openness, peace and freedom of belief needed to be propagated to dry up the well of IS.
"We call on everyone who claims to have an interest in our fate to help us to remain. We call on it to take its responsibility and to stop the wars in our land," they said in an appeal to the international community.
The five patriarchs were the leaders of Antiochian Greek Catholic Church, the Syriac Orthodox Church, the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, the Syriac Catholic Church and the Maronite Church. The Vatican's ambassador to Syria also attended.
"We are authentic people of this land, deeply rooted in its earth that was watered by the sweat of our fathers and grandfathers, and we confirm more than ever that we are staying," they said.
In a further homily at St Anthony's Cathedral in Damascus, Cardinal Bechara Rai, Marointe patriarch, also called for "stopping the war, for political solutions and for the honoured return" of the 12 million Syrians forced to flee their homeland, more than a million of them to Lebanon.
"We condemn injustice, the death of the world's conscience and all those who provide arms and money for sabotage, destruction, killing and displacement," Cardinal Rai said.
Of the meeting with the other four patriarchs, Cardinal Rai said: "We will reflect together, we unite in thought, word and deed, bringing together the concern of our people in Syria and Iraq as well as in various countries of the Middle East, in the hope that this Way of the Cross is followed by the Resurrection.
"We carry the cause of all Christians, people of Syria, Iraq, Palestine and Yemen and any country that suffers. We, the five Eastern patriarchs, are here to pray for peace. We pray for peace in Syria and the region; we pray for the dead conscience of the international community. We pray for a peaceful resolution of the crisis in Syria, and that Syrians – Christians and Muslims – remain attached to their land, and for the return to their homes in dignity, of those that the war displaced."
He said hope should not be abandoned.
"Despite proponents of war, those who fund it and mercenaries who make a trade and profit, I am convinced that this wave of violence is fleeting. We are invited to hold on. Many have shed their blood, many were martyred but their blood was not shed in vain. Many also have been forced to flee. I add my voice to that of Pope Francis, who does not let a week go by without praying for peace in Syria. The essential thing is not to lose our Christian maturity. We patriarchs are with you, before you, with you in prayer."
Cardinal Rai last visited Syria in February 2013 for the enthronement of Greek Orthodox Patriarch John X of Antioch and all the East. His visit was considered an historic milestone because it was the first by the head of the Maronite Church since Lebanon's independence from France in 1943.
