Maronite Patriarch Beshara al-Rahi called on officials on Saturday to find consensus among each other and to resume the national dialogue in order to reach a new national charter based on 1943 National Covenant. “It is time for us to have brave, free and unbiased” politicians, al-Rahi said during a mass held at Our Lady of Sorrows church in Toronto. The Patriarch stressed on the Lebanese peoples’ need to be loyal only to Lebanon.

“It’s not allowed for the administrative and diplomatic appointments (in state posts) to remain at a standstill,” al-Rahi noted. He reiterated his calls on Lebanese expatriates to swiftly register their spouses and children in the Lebanese embassies and consulates in order to obtain their home country’s nationality. “If you were forced to sell your lands in Lebanon then return and buy new ones,” al-Rahi said.