Vatican City: Pope Francis shed his floor-length white coat before leading a New Year’s Eve service at the Vatican Thursday.

Speaking at St. Peter’s Basilica, he said it is difficult to forget “so many days marked by violence, by death, by the unspeakable suffering of so many innocents” but urged the faithful to remember the “great gestures of goodness, love and solidarity” that don’t make the news, reported New York Post.

“These signs of love can’t and mustn’t be obscured by the tyranny of evil,” the pope said.

He also admitted to a group of 6,000 young international singers, part of the Pueri Cantores, that he doesn’t have great singing chops.

“I like to hear singing, but if I would sing, it would seem like a donkey,” he joked.