Pope Francis says ‘gossip is a plague more awful than’ coronavirus

• On Sunday Pope Francis said that Gossip is worse than the coronavirus, according to The Associated Press.
• “Please, brothers and sisters, let us make an effort not to gossip,” Pope Francis said. “Gossip is a plague more awful than Covid!”
• According to The Vatican News, Pope Francis called the devil a “great gossiper who seeks to sow discord” within the Catholic Church community. 
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During prayer, Pope Francis said that talking about others is a plague worse than the coronavirus on Sunday, The Associated Press reported. 

“Please, brothers and sisters, let us make an effort not to gossip,”  Pope Francis said, according to the Associated Press. “Gossip is a plague more awful than Covid!”

The outlet reported that Pope Francis said that the devil is the “biggest gossiper” and uses his deception to create tension within the Catholic church. 

 “Gossip closes a person’s heart to the community and hurts the Church’s unity, since the devil is the great gossiper who seeks to sow discord,” Pope Francis said, according to The Vatican News.

—Vatican News (@VaticanNews) September 6, 2020

CNN reported that Pope Francis commented on the topic of gossip on several other occasions. According to the outlet, in 2016 Pope Francis told religious officials that if they feel the need to gossip to “bite their tongue hard” and in 2018 he said, “the tongue kills like a knife” to pilgrims. 

According to John Hopkin's COVID-19 dashboard, Italy has over 250,000 coronavirus cases and 35,541 virus-related deaths to date.