News April 2023

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In greeting each of you, I express my appreciation for your fine words of welcome, which I will address in a moment. This is the final meeting of my visit to Hungary, for which I am most grateful. Here I think of the course of the Danube, which links this country to many others, uniting not only their geography but also their history. Culture is in some sense like a great river: it runs through and connects various areas of life and history, enabling us to navigate in this world and to embrace distant countries and lands. It nurtures the mind, satisfies the soul, and fosters the growth of society. The very word culture comes from the verb to cultivate: knowledge entails a constant planting of seeds that take root in the soil of reality and bear rich fruit.

30.04.23 ae

I thank Cardinal Erdő for his kind words, and I greet Her Excellency the President, the Prime Minister and the Authorities present. As I prepare to return to Rome, I wish to express my gratitude to them, to my brother bishops, the priests and consecrated men and women, and to all the beloved Hungarian people for their warm welcome and the affection I have experienced in these days. I am also grateful to those who travelled a great distance to be here and to those who worked so hard, and so well, for this visit. To all of you I say, köszönöm, Isten fizesse! [Thank you, may God reward you!]. I think especially of the sick and the elderly, of those who were unable to be present with us, of those who are lonely and those who have lost faith in God and hope in life. I am close to all of you; I pray for you and I give you my blessing.

My greeting goes likewise to the members of the Diplomatic Corps and our brothers and sisters of other Christian confessions. I thank you for your presence and for the fact that in this country the different confessions and religions interact and are supportive of one another. Cardinal Erdő said that here you have been living “on the eastern border of Western Christianity for a thousand years.” It is a beautiful thing when borders do not represent boundaries that separate, but points of contact, and when believers in Christ emphasize first the charity that unites us, rather than the historical, cultural and religious differences that divide us. We are united by the Gospel, and it is by returning there, to the source, that our ecumenical journey will continue, in accordance with the will of Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who desires us to be united in one flock.

We now turn to Our Lady. To her, Magna Domina Hungarorum, whom you invoke as Queen and Patroness, I entrust all Hungarians. From this great city and from this noble country, I desire to entrust to her heart the faith and the future of the entire continent of Europe, which has been on my mind in these days and, in particular, the cause of peace. Blessed Virgin, watch over the peoples who suffer so greatly. In a special way, watch over the neighbouring, beleaguered Ukrainian people and the Russian people, both consecrated to you.  You, who are the Queen of Peace, instil in the hearts of peoples and their leaders the desire to build peace and to give the younger generations a future of hope, not war, a future full of cradles not tombs, a world of brothers and sisters, not walls and barricades.

To you do we turn, Holy Mother of God! After the resurrection of Jesus, you accompanied the first steps of the Christian community, helping the disciples to persevere as one in prayer (cf. Acts 1:14). You held the faithful together, guarding their unity by your docile and generous example. We pray to you for the Church in Europe, that she may find strength in prayer, renewed humility and obedience, and be an example of convincing witness and joyful proclamation. To you we entrust this Church and this country. As you exulted in the resurrection of your Son, so fill our hearts with the joy of his presence. Dear brothers and sisters, this is my wish for you, that you may spread everywhere the joy of Christ. Isten éltessen! [Best wishes!].  With gratitude for these days, I keep you in my heart and I ask you to pray for me. Isten áld meg a magyart! [God bless the Hungarians!]

30.04.23 rc

Jesus’ final words in the Gospel we have just heard sum up the meaning of his mission: “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly” (Jn 10:10). That is what a good shepherd does: he gives his life for his sheep. Jesus, like a shepherd who goes in search of his flock, came to find us when we were lost. Like a shepherd, he came to snatch us from death. Like a shepherd who knows each of his sheep and loves them with infinite tenderness, he brought us back to the Father’s fold and made us his children.

Let us reflect, then, on the image of the Good Shepherd and on two specific things that, according to the Gospel, he does for the sheep. He calls them by name, and then he leads them out.

First, “he calls his sheep by name” (v. 3). The history of salvation does not begin with us, with our merits, our abilities and our structures. It begins with the call of God, with his desire to come to us, with his concern for each one of us, with the abundance of his mercy. The Lord wants to save us from sin and death, to give us life in abundance and joy without end. Jesus came as the Good Shepherd of humanity, to call us and bring us home. With gratitude, all of us can think back on the love he showed us when we had wandered far from him. When we, like sheep, had “gone astray” and each one of us “turned to his own way” (Is 53:6). Jesus took upon himself our iniquities and bore our sins, leading us back to the Father’s heart. This is what we heard from the apostle Peter in today’s second reading: “You were going astray like sheep, but now you have returned to the shepherd and guardian of your souls” (1 Pet 2:25). Today too, Jesus calls us, in every situation, at all those times when we feel confused and fearful, overwhelmed and burdened by sorrow and self-pity. He comes to us as the Good Shepherd, he calls us by name and tells us how precious we are in his eyes. He heals our wounds, takes upon himself our frailties and gathers us into the unity of his fold, as children of the Father and brothers and sisters of one another.

And so, brothers and sisters, this morning, in this place, we sense the joy of our being God’s holy people. All of us were born of his call. He called us together, and so we are his people, his flock, his Church. Though we are diverse and come from different communities, the Lord has brought us together, so that his immense love can enfold us in one embrace. It is good for us to be together: bishops and priests, religious and lay faithful. And it is beautiful to share this joy of ours with the ecumenical delegations, the leaders of the Jewish community, the representatives of civil institutions and the diplomatic corps. This is the meaning of catholicity: all of us, called by name by the Good Shepherd, are summoned to receive and spread his love, to make his fold inclusive and never to exclude others. It follows that all of us are called to cultivate relationships of fraternity and cooperation, avoiding divisions, not retreating into our own community, not concerned to stake out our individual territory, but rather opening our hearts to mutual love.

After calling his sheep, the Shepherd “leads them out” (Jn 10:3). First, he brought them into the fold, calling them by name; now he sends them out. We too were first gathered into God’s family to become his people; then we too were sent out into the world so that, courageously and fearlessly, we might become heralds of the Good News, witnesses of the love that has given us new birth. We can appreciate this process of “entering” and “leaving” from yet another image that Jesus uses. He says, “I am the door; if anyone enters through me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture” (v. 9). Let us listen to those words again: “he will go in and out”. On the one hand, Jesus is the wide open door that enables us to enter into the Father’s fellowship and experience his mercy. Yet, as we all know, open doors are not only for entering, but also for leaving. After bringing us back into God’s embrace and into the fold of the Church, Jesus is the door that leads us back into the world. He urges us to go forth to encounter our brothers and sisters. Let us never forget that all of us, without exception, are called to this; we are called to step out of our comfort zones and find the courage to reach out to all those peripheries that need the light of the Gospel (cf. Evangelii Gaudium, 20).

Brothers and sisters, “going forth” means that we, like Jesus, must become open doors. How sad and painful it is to see closed doors. The closed doors of our selfishness with regard to others; the closed doors of our individualism amid a society of growing isolation; the closed doors of our indifference towards the underprivileged and those who suffer; the doors we close towards those who are foreign or unlike us, towards migrants or the poor. Closed doors also within our ecclesial communities: doors closed to other people, closed to the world, closed to those who are “irregular”, closed to those who long for God’s forgiveness. Please, brothers and sisters, let us open those doors! Let us try to be – in our words, deeds and daily activities – like Jesus, an open door: a door that is never shut in anyone’s face, a door that enables everyone to enter and experience the beauty of the Lord’s love and forgiveness.

I repeat this especially to myself and to my brother bishops and priests: to those of us who are shepherds. Jesus tells us that a good shepherd is neither a robber nor a thief (cf. Jn 10:8). In other words, he does not take advantage of his role; he does not lord it over the flock entrusted to his care; he does not occupy spaces that belong to his lay brothers and sisters; he does not exercise inflexible authority. Brothers, let us encourage one another to be increasingly open doors: “facilitators” of God’s grace, masters of closeness; let us be ready to offer our lives, even as Christ, our Lord and our all, teaches us with open arms from the throne of the cross and shows us daily as the living Bread broken for us on the altar. I say this also to our lay brothers and sisters, to catechists and pastoral workers, to those with political and social responsibilities, and to those who simply go about their daily lives, which at times are not easy. Be open doors! Let the Lord of life enter our hearts, with his words of consolation and healing, so that we can then go forth as open doors within society. Be open and inclusive, then, and in this way, help Hungary to grow in fraternity, which is the path of peace.

Dear brothers and sisters, Jesus the Good Shepherd calls us by name and cares for us with infinitely tender love. He is the door, and all who enter through him have eternal life. He is our future, a future of “life in abundance” (Jn 10:10). Let us never be discouraged. Let us never be robbed of the joy and peace he has given us. Let us never withdraw into our own problems or turn away from others in apathy. May the Good Shepherd accompany us always: with him, our lives, our families, our Christian communities and all of Hungary will flourish with new and abundant life!

30.04.23 m

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I would like to say köszönöm! [thank you!] for your dance, your song and your courageous testimonies. I thank each of you for being here today: I am happy to be with you! Thank you.

Bishop Ferenc has told us that youth is a time for important questions and responses. That is true, and it is important that you have someone to encourage you and to listen to your questions, not to give you simplistic, pre-packaged answers, which are useless and cannot make us happy, but to help you fearlessly face the adventure of life as you search for the right answers. That is exactly what Jesus did. 

29.04.23 ype

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I am happy to be here with you. Thank you, Bishop Antal, for your words of welcome, and for describing the generous service that the Hungarian Church carries out for and with the poor. Those in need – let us never forget – are at the heart of the Gospel, for Jesus came among us “to bring glad tidings to the poor” (Lk 4:18). The poor, then, present us with a great challenge: we must refuse to let the faith we profess be imprisoned by a piety removed from life, one that results in a kind of “spiritual egotism”, a spirituality of my own creation that serves to preserve my own inner tranquillity and complacency. Genuine faith is challenging, it takes risks, it leads us to encounter the poor and, by the witness of our lives, to speak the language of charity. Saint Paul tells us that we may speak in many tongues and possess great wisdom and wealth, but if we lack charity, we have nothing and we are nothing (cf. 1 Cor 13:1-13).

29.04.23 pre

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I am happy to be with you once again, after we shared the experience of the 52nd International Eucharistic Congress. The Congress was a moment of great grace, and I am sure that you continue to enjoy its spiritual fruits. I thank Bishop Veres for his kind introduction, in which he expressed the desire of Hungary’s Catholics in these words: “In this changing world we want to testify that Christ is our future”. Christ: it is not “the future is Christ” but Christ is our future. We cannot interchange the two. This is one of the most important things demanded of us: to interpret the changes and transformations of our time, seeking to meet pastoral challenges as best we can. With Christ and in Christ. There is nothing beyond the Lord or too far from him.

28.04.23 cpe

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I greet you all most cordially and I thank Madam President for her welcome and her kind and profound words. Politics was born of the city, the polis, and the practical desire to live together in unity, ensuring rights and respecting obligations. Few cities help us realize this as does Budapest, for it is not only a noble and lively metropolis, but also a theatre of great historical events. Having witnessed momentous events in the past, it is called to take a leading role in the present and in the future. Here, as one of your great poets wrote, “we are tenderly embraced by the Danube, which is our past, our present and our future” (A. JÓZSEF, The Danube). I would now like to share a few thoughts with you, taking as my starting point Budapest itself: a city of history, a city of bridges and a city of saints.

28.04.23 e

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Let us continue our catechesis on the witnesses of apostolic zeal. We started with Saint Paul, and last time we looked at the martyrs, who proclaim Jesus with their lives, to the point of giving their lives for Him and for the Gospel. But there is another great witness that runs through the history of faith: that of the nuns and monks, sisters and brothers who renounce themselves and who renounce the world to imitate Jesus on the path of poverty, chastity, and obedience, and to intercede on behalf of all. Their lives speak for themselves, but we might ask: how can people living in monasteries help the proclamation of the Gospel? Wouldn't they do better to put their energies into the mission? Coming out of the monastery and preaching the Gospel, outside … outside the monastery? In reality, the monks are the beating heart of the proclamation. This is curious: they are the beating heart. Their prayer is oxygen for all the members of the Body of Christ, their prayer is the invisible force that sustains the mission. It is no coincidence that the patroness of the missions is a nun, Saint Therese of the Child Jesus. Let us listen to how she discovered her vocation – she wrote: “I understood that the Church had a Heart and that this Heart was burning with love. I understood it was Love alone that made the Church’s members act, that if Love ever became extinct, apostles would not preach the Gospel and martyrs would not shed their blood. I understood that love comprised all vocations. … Then, in the excess of my delirious joy, I cried out: O Jesus, my Love .... my vocation, at last I have found it.... my vocation is love! … In the heart of the Church, my Mother, I shall be Love” (Autobiographical Manuscript “B”, 8 September 1896). Contemplatives, monks, nuns: people who pray, work, pray, in silence, for all the Church. And this is love: it is the love that is expressed by praying for the Church, working for the Church, in the monasteries.

This love for everyone inspires the life of nuns and monks, and is translated into their prayer of intercession. In this regard, I would like to offer you the example of Saint Gregory of Narek, Doctor of the Church. He is an Armenian monk, who lived around the year 1000, who left a book of prayers, in which the faith of the Armenian people, the first to embrace Christianity, is poured out; a people that, joined to the cross of Christ, has suffered so much throughout history. And Saint Gregory spent almost his entire life in the monastery of Narek. There he learned to peer into the depths of the human soul and, by fusing poetry and prayer together, marked the pinnacle of both Armenian literature and spirituality. What is most striking about him is the universal solidarity of which he is an interpreter. And among monks and nuns there is a universal solidarity: whatever happens in the world, finds a place in the heart, in their heart, and they pray, and they pray. The heart of monks and nuns is a heart that captures like an antenna, it picks up what happens in the world, and prays and intercedes for this. And in this way: they live in union with the Lord and with everyone. And one of them said: “I have voluntarily taken upon myself all faults, from those of the first father down to the last of his descendants, and I have held myself responsible for them”. It is what Jesus did: they take upon themselves the problems of the world, the difficulties, the ailments, many things, and they pray for them. And these are the great evangelizers. Monasteries are … but how can they live closed up, and evangelize? It is true… because with the word, for example,  by intercession and daily work, they are a bridge of intercession for all people and all sins. They weep, even shedding tears, they weep for their sins – after all, we are all sinners – and they also weep for the sins of the world, and they pray and intercede with their hands and heart raised up. Let us think a little of this – if I may permit myself the use of the word – “reserve” that we have in the Church: they are the true strength, the true force that carries the People of God forward, and this is where the habit comes from that people have – the People of God – of saying “Pray for me, pray for me”, when they meet a consecrated man or woman, because they know there is a prayer of intercession. It will do us good – to the extent we are able – to visit a monastery, because there one prays and works. Each one has its own rules, but their hands are always occupied: engaged in work, engaged in prayer. May the Lord give us new monasteries, may he give us new monks and nuns to carry the Church forward with their intercession. Thank you.

26.04.23 e

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On this third Sunday of Easter, the Gospel narrates the encounter of the Risen Jesus with the disciples of Emmaus (cf. Lk 24:13-35). These are two disciples who, resigned to the death of the Master, decide on the day of Passover to leave Jerusalem and to return home. Perhaps they were a little uneasy because they had heard the women coming from the sepulchre and saying that the Lord was like that… they go away. And while they are walking, sadly talking about what has happened, Jesus appears beside them, but they do not recognize him. He asks them why they are so sad, and they say to him: “But, are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?” (v. 18). And Jesus replies: “What things?” (v. 19). And they tell him the entire story, and Jesus makes them tell him the story. Then, while they are walking, he helps them reinterpret the facts in a different way, in the light of the prophecies, of the Word of God, of all that had been proclaimed to the people of Israel. To reread: that is what Jesus does with them, helping to reread. Let us dwell on this aspect.

Indeed, for us to it is important to reread our history together with Jesus: the story of our life, of a certain period, of our days, with its disappointments and hopes. Besides, we too, like those disciples, faced with what happens to us, can find ourselves lost in the face of these events, alone and uncertain, with many questions and worries, disappointments, many things. Today’s Gospel invites us to tell Jesus everything, sincerely, without being afraid of disturbing him: he listens; without fear of saying the wrong thing, without shame at our struggle to understand. The Lord is happy whenever we open ourselves to him; only in this way can he take us by the hand, accompany us and make our hearts burn again (cf. v. 32). We too, then, like the disciples of Emmaus, are called to spend time with him so that, when evening comes, he will remain with us (cf. v. 29).

There is a good way of doing this, and today I would like to propose it to you: it consists of dedicating some time, every evening, to a brief examination of conscience. But, what happened today within me? That is the question. It is a matter of rereading the day with Jesus, rereading my day:  opening the heart to him, bringing to him people, choices, fears, falls and hopes, all the things that happened; to learn gradually to look at things with different eyes, with his eyes and not just our own. We can thus relive the experience of those two disciples. Before Christ’s love, even that which seems wearisome and unsuccessful can appear under another light: a difficult cross to embrace, the decision to forgive an offence, a missed opportunity for redress, the toil of work, the sincerity that comes at a price, and the trials of family life can appear to us in a new light, the light of the Crucified and Risen, who knows how to turn every fall into a step forward. But to do this, it is important to drop our defences: to leave time and space for Jesus, not to hide anything from him, to bring him our miseries, to let ourselves be wounded by his truth, to let our heart vibrate at the breath of his Word.

We can begin today, to dedicate this evening a moment of prayer during which we ask ourselves: how was my day? What were its joys, what were its sorrows, what were its mundanities, what happened? What were the pearls of the day, possibly hidden, to be thankful for? Was there a little love in what I did? And what are the falls, the sadness, the doubts and fears to bring to Jesus so that He can open new ways to me, to lift me up and encourage me? May Mary, wise Virgin, help us to recognize Jesus who walks with us and to reread- the word: re-read – every day of our life in front of him.

23.04.23 e

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After talking about evangelization and talking about apostolic zeal, after considering the witness of Saint Paul, the true “champion” of apostolic zeal, today we will turn our attention not to a single figure, but to the host of  martyrs, men and women of every age, language and nation who have given their life for Christ, who have shed their blood to confess Christ. After the generation of the Apostles, they were the quintessential “witnesses” of the Gospel. The martyrs: the first was the deacon Saint Stephen, stoned to death outside the walls of Jerusalem. The word “martyr” derives from the Greek  martyria, which indeed means  witness. That is, a martyr is a witness, one who bears witness to the point of shedding their blood. However, very soon in the Church the word martyr began to be used to indicate those who bore witness to the point of shedding their blood. That is, a martyr can be one who witnesses every day. But it was used afterwards for one who gives their blood, who gives their life.

The martyrs, however, are not to be seen as “heroes” who acted individually, like flowers blooming in a desert, but as the ripe and excellent fruit of the vineyard of the Lord, which is the Church. In particular, Christians, by participating assiduously in the celebration of the Eucharist, were led by the Spirit to base their lives on that mystery of love: namely, on the fact that the Lord Jesus had given his life for them, and therefore that they too could and should give their life for Him and for their brothers and sisters. A great generosity, the journey of Christian witness. Saint Augustine often underlines this dynamic of gratitude and the gratuitous reciprocation of giving. Here, for example, is what he preached on the feast of Saint Lawrence: in that Church of Rome, said Saint Augustine, “he performed the office of deacon; it was there that he administered the sacred chalice of Christ’s blood; there that he shed his own blood for the name of Christ. The blessed apostle John clearly explained the mystery of the Lord’s supper when he said, ‘Just as Christ laid down his life for us, so we too ought to lay down our lives for the brethren’ (1 Jn 3:16). Saint Lawrence understood this, my brethren, and he did it; and he undoubtedly prepared things similar to what he received at that table. He loved Christ in his life, he imitated him in his death” (Sermons 304, 14; PL 38, 1395-1397). In this way Saint Augustine explained the spiritual dynamism that inspired the martyrs. With these words: the martyrs love Christ in his life and imitate him in his death.

Today, dear brothers and sisters, let us remember all the martyrs who have accompanied the life of the Church. As I have already said many times before, they are more numerous in our time than in the first centuries. Today there are many martyrs in the Church, many of them, because for confessing the Christian faith they are banished from society or end up in prison… there are many. Vatican Council II reminds us that “The Church considers martyrdom”, this disciple, “as an exceptional gift and as the fullest proof of love. By martyrdom a disciple is transformed into an image of his Master by freely accepting death for the salvation of the world – as well as his conformity to Christ in the shedding of his blood” (Dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium, 42). The martyrs, in imitation of Christ and with his grace, turn the violence of those who refuse the proclamation into a great occasion of love, supreme, which goes as far as forgiveness of their own tormentors. This is interesting: the martyrs always forgive their tormentors. Stephen, the first martyr, died praying, “Lord, forgive them, they know not what they do”. The martyrs pray for their tormentors.

Although martyrdom is asked of only a few, “nevertheless all must be prepared to confess Christ before men. They must be prepared to make the profession of faith even in the midst of persecutions, which will never be lacking to the Church, in following the way of the cross” (ibid., 42). But, were these persecutions something of those times? No, no: today. Today there are persecutions of Christians throughout the world, many, many. There are more martyrs today than in the first times. Many. The martyrs show us that every Christian is called to the witness of life, even when this does not go as far as the shedding of blood, making a gift of themselves to God and to their brethren, in imitation of Jesus.

And I would like to conclude by recalling the Christian witness present in every corner of the world. I think, for example, of Yemen, a land that has for many years been afflicted by a terrible, forgotten war, that has caused many deaths and still causes many people, especially children, to suffer today. In this very land there have been shining witnesses of faith, such as that of the Missionary Sisters of Charity, who have given their life there. They are still present today in Yemen, where they offer assistance to the elderly sick and to people with disabilities. Some of them have suffered martyrdom, but the others continue, risking their lives, but they keep on going. These sisters welcome everyone, of any religion, because charity and fraternity have no boundaries. In July 1998, Sister Aletta, Sister Zelia and Sister Michael, while returning home after Mass, were killed by a fanatic, because they were Christians. More recently, shortly after the beginning of the still ongoing conflict, in March 2016, Sister Anselm, Sister Marguerite, Sister Reginette and Sister Judith were killed together with some laypeople who helped them in their work of charity among the least. They are the martyrs of our time. Among these laypeople killed, as well as Christians there were some Muslim faithful who worked with the religious sisters. It moves us to see how the witness of blood can unite people of different religions. One should never kill in the name of God, because for Him we are all brothers and sisters. But together one can give one’s life for others.

Let us pray, then, that we may never tire of bearing witness to the Gospel, even in times of tribulation. May all the martyr saints be seeds of peace and reconciliation among peoples, for a more humane and fraternal world, as we await the full manifestation of the Kingdom of Heaven, when God will be all in all (cf. 1 Cor 15:28). Thank you.

19.04.23 e

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Today, Divine Mercy Sunday, the Gospel recounts two apparitions of the Risen Jesus to his disciples, and in particular, to Thomas, the “doubting Apostle” (cf. Jn 20:24-29).

In reality, Thomas is not the only one who struggled to believe. In fact, he represents all of us a little bit. Indeed, it is not always easy to believe, especially when, as in his case, he had suffered a tremendous disappointment. And after such a huge disappoint, it was difficult to believe. He had followed Jesus for years, running risks, and enduring discomforts. But the Teacher had been put on a cross like a criminal, and no one had freed him. No one had done anything! He was dead and everyone was afraid. How could he trust again? How he could trust such news that said he was alive? There was a doubt inside him.

Thomas, however, shows that he was courageous. While the others had closed themselves inside the Upper Room out of fear, he went out, running the risk that someone might recognize, report and arrest him. We could even think that, with his courage, he would have deserved more than the others to meet the Risen Lord. Instead, precisely because he had been away, Thomas was not there when Jesus had appeared the first time to the disciples on Easter evening, thus losing that opportunity. He had gone away from the community. How could he retrieve the opportunity? Only by going back with the others, returning to that family he had left behind, scared and sad. When he does so, when he returns, they tell him that Jesus had come, but he struggles to believe – he wants to see his wounds. And Jesus satisfies him: eight days later, he appears again in the midst of his disciples and shows them his wounds, his hands, his feet, these wounds that are the proof of his love, that are the ever-open channels of his mercy.

Let us reflect on these facts. In order to believe, Thomas wants an extraordinary sign – to touch the wounds. Jesus shows them to him, but in an ordinary way, coming in front of everyone, in the community, not outside. It’s as if he said to him: if you want to meet me, do not look far away, remain in the community, with the others. Don’t go away…pray with them…break bread with them. And he says this to us as well. That is where you will find me; that is where I will show you the signs of the wounds impressed on my body: the signs of the Love that overcomes hatred, of the Pardon that disarms revenge, the signs of the Life that conquers death. It is there, in the community, that you will discover my face, as you share moments of doubt and fear with your brothers and sisters, clinging even more strongly to them. Without the community, it is difficult to find Jesus.

Dear brothers and sisters, the invitation given to Thomas is valid for us as well. We, where do we seek the Risen One? In some special event, in some spectacular or amazing religious manifestation, solely at the emotional or sensational level? Or rather in the community, in the Church, accepting the challenge of staying there, even though it is not perfect? Despite all of its limitations and failures, which are our limitations and failings, our Mother Church is the Body of Christ. And it is there, in the Body of Christ, that, now and forever, the greatest signs of his love can be found impressed. Let us ask ourselves, however, if in the name of this love, in the name of Jesus’s wounds, whether we are willing to open our arms to those who are wounded by life, excluding no one from God’s mercy, but welcoming everyone – each person like a brother, like a sister, like God welcomes everyone. God welcomes everyone.

May Mary, the Mother of Mercy, help us to love the Church and to make her a welcoming home for everyone.

16.04.23 e

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After having seen, two weeks ago, St Paul's personal zeal for the Gospel, we can now reflect more deeply on the evangelical zeal as he himself speaks of it and describes it in some of his letters.

By virtue of his own experience, Paul is not unaware of the danger of a distorted zeal, oriented in the wrong direction. He himself had fallen into this danger before the providential fall on the road to Damascus. Sometimes we have to deal with a misdirected zeal, doggedly persistent in the observance of purely human and obsolete norms for the Christian community. “They make much of you,” writes the Apostle, “but for no good purpose” (Gal 4:17). We cannot ignore the solicitude with which some devote themselves to the wrong pursuits even within the Christian community itself; one can boast of a false evangelical zeal while actually pursuing vainglory or one’s own convictions or a little bit of love of self.

For this reason, we ask ourselves, what are the characteristics of true evangelical zeal according to Paul? The text we heard at the beginning seems useful for this, a list of “arms” that the Apostle indicates for the spiritual battle. Among these is readiness to spread the Gospel, translated by some as “zeal”.

Evangelical zeal is the support on which proclamation is based, and heralds are somewhat like the feet of the body of Christ that is the Church. There is no proclamation without movement, without ‘going out’, without initiative. This mean there is no Christian if not on the move; no Christian if the Christian does not go out of themself in order to set out on the journey and bear the proclamation.  One does not proclaim the Gospel standing still, locked in an office, at one’s desk or at one’s computer, arguing like ‘keyboard warriors’ and replacing the creativity of proclamation with copy-and-paste ideas taken from here and there. The Gospel is proclaimed by moving, by walking, by going.

One who proclaims the Gospel cannot be fossilised in cages of plausibility or the idea that “it has always been done this way,” but is ready to follow a wisdom that is not of this world.

This is why, brothers and sisters, it is important to have this readiness for the newness of the Gospel, this attitude that involves momentum, taking the initiative, going first. It means not letting pass by the opportunities to promulgate the Gospel of peace, that peace that Christ knows how to give more and better than the world gives.

And for this reason I exhort you to be evangelizers who are moving, without fear, who go forward, in order to bring the beauty of Jesus, to bring the newness of Jesus who changes everything. “Yes, Father, He changes the calendar, because now we count the years beginning with Jesus…” But does He also change the heart? And are you disposed to let Jesus change your heart? Or are you a lukewarm Christian, who is not moving? Think about it: Are you an enthusiast of Jesus, are you going forward? Think about it a bit.

12.04.23 e

Excerpt below, for the full transcript click on the picture link above

Today the Gospel lets us relive the women’s encounter with the Risen Jesus on Easter morning. It thus reminds us that it was them, the women disciples, who were the first to see him and encounter him.

We might ask ourselves: why them? For a very simple reason: because they were the first to go to the tomb. Like all the disciples, they too were suffering because of the way the story of Jesus seemed to have ended; but, unlike the others, they do not stay at home paralyzed by sadness and fear: in the early morning, at sunrise, they go to honour the body of Jesus, bringing aromatic ointments. The tomb had been sealed and they wonder who could have removed that stone, so heavy (cf. Mk 16:1-3). But their wish to carry out this gesture of love prevails over all else. They are not discouraged, they overcome their fears and their anguish. This is the way to find the Risen One: to come out from our fears, to come out from our anguish.

Let us run through the scene described in the Gospel: the women arrive, they see the empty tomb and, “with fear and great joy”, they run, the text says, “to tell his disciples” (Mt 28:8). Now, just as they are going to give this news, Jesus comes towards them. Let us take good note of this: Jesus meets them while they are going to announce him. This is beautiful: Jesus meets them while they are going to announce him. When we proclaim the Lord, the Lord comes to us. At times we think that the way to be close to God is that of keeping him close to us; because then, if we reveal ourselves and start to talk about it, then judgements, criticisms come, perhaps we do not know how to respond to certain questions or provocations, and so it is better not to talk about it, and to close up: no Instead, the Lord comes while we proclaim him. You always find the Lord on the path of proclamation. Proclaim the Lord and you will encounter him. Seek the Lord and you will encounter him. Always on the path, this is what the women teach us: we encounter Jesus by witnessing him. We encounter Jesus by witnessing him.

Let us give an example. At times we will have received wonderful news, such as, for example, the birth of a child. So, one of the first things we do is to share this happy announcement with friends: “You know, I have had a baby… He is beautiful”. And, by telling it, we also repeat it to ourselves and somehow make it come alive again for us. If this happens for good news, every day or on some important days, it happens infinitely more for Jesus, who is not only good news, nor even the best news of life, no, but he is life itself, he is “the resurrection and the life” (Jn 11:25). Every time we announce it, not by propaganda or proselytizing – that, no: proclaiming is one thing, propaganda and proselytism are another matter – every time we proclaim him, the Lord comes towards us. He comes with respect and love, as the most beautiful gift to share, Jesus dwells in us every time we proclaim him.

Let us think again of the women of the Gospel: there was the sealed stone and despite this, they go to the tomb; there was an entire city that had seen Jesus on the cross and nevertheless they go to the city to announce that he is alive. Dear brothers and sisters, when one encounters Jesus, no obstacle can prevent us from proclaiming him. If instead we keep his joy for ourselves, perhaps it is because we have not yet truly encountered him.

Brothers, sisters, before the women's experience we ask ourselves: tell me, when was the last time you bore witness to Jesus? When was the last time I bore witness to Jesus? Today, what shall I do so that the people I meet receive the joy of his proclamation? And again: can someone say: this person is serene, happy, good, because he has met Jesus? Can this be said of every one of us? Let us ask Our Lady to help us be joyful proclaimers of the Gospel.

10.04.23 e

Dear brothers and sisters, Christ is risen!

On this day we proclaim that he, the Lord of our life, is “the resurrection and the life” of the world (cf. Jn 11:25). Today is Easter, the Pasch, a word that means “passage”, for in Jesus the decisive passage of humanity has been made: the passage from death to life, from sin to grace, from fear to confidence, from desolation to communion in him. He is the Lord of time and history, I would like to say to everyone, with heartfelt joy, Happy Easter to all!

May this Easter be for each of you, dear brothers and sisters, and in particular for the sick and the poor, the elderly and those experiencing moments of trial and weariness, a passage from affliction to consolation. We are not alone: Jesus, the Living One, is with us, forever. Let the Church and the world rejoice, for today our hopes no longer come up against the wall of death, for the Lord has built us a bridge to life. Yes, brothers and sisters, at Easter the destiny of the world was changed, and on this day, which also coincides with the most probable date of Christ’s resurrection, we can rejoice to celebrate, by pure grace, the most important and beautiful day of history.

“Christ is risen; he is truly risen!” In this traditional proclamation of the Churches of the East: Christòs anesti! That word “truly” reminds us that our hope is not an illusion, but the truth! And that, in the wake of Easter, humanity’s journey, now marked by hope, advances all the more readily. The first witnesses of the resurrection show this by their example. The Gospels speak of the haste with which, on the morning of Easter, the women “ran to tell the disciples” (Mt 28:8). Mary Magdalene then “ran and went to Simon Peter” (Jn 20:2), while John and Peter himself then “ran together” (cf. v. 4) to the place where Jesus had been buried. Later, on the evening of Easter, after meeting the Risen Lord on the road to Emmaus, two disciples “set out without delay” (cf. Lk 24:33) and traveled several miles, uphill and in the dark, spurred on by the irrepressible joy of Easter that burned in their hearts (cf. v. 32). The same joy that led Peter, on the shore of the Lake of Galilee, after catching sight of the risen Jesus, to leave the boat with the others, to throw himself immediately into the water and to swim quickly towards him (cf. Jn 21:7). At Easter, then, the journey quickens and becomes a race, since humanity now sees the goal of its journey, sees the meaning of its destiny, Jesus Christ, and is called to make haste to meet him, who is the hope of the world.

May we too make haste to progress on a journey of reciprocal trust: trust among individuals, peoples and nations. May we allow ourselves to experience amazement at the joyful proclamation of Easter, at the light that illumines the darkness and the gloom in which, all too often, our world finds itself enveloped.

Let us make haste to surmount our conflicts and divisions, and to open our hearts to those in greatest need. Let us hasten to pursue paths of peace and fraternity. Let us rejoice at the concrete signs of hope that reach us from so many countries, beginning with those that offer assistance and welcome to all fleeing from war and poverty.

At the same time, along this journey we also encounter many stumbling stones, which make it more difficult and demanding to hasten towards the Risen Lord. To him, then, let us make our prayer: Lord, help us to run to meet you! Help us to open our hearts!

Help the beloved Ukrainian people on their journey towards peace, and shed the light of Easter upon the people of Russia. Comfort the wounded and all those who have lost loved ones because of the war, and grant that prisoners may return safe and sound to their families. Open the hearts of the entire international community to strive to end this war and all conflict and bloodshed in our world, beginning with Syria, which still awaits peace. Strengthen all those affected by the violent earthquake in Turkey and in Syria itself. Let us pray for all those who have lost family and friends, and for those left homeless. May they receive consolation from God and assistance from the family of nations.

On this day, Lord, we entrust to you the city of Jerusalem, the first witness of your resurrection. May there be a resumption of dialogue, in a climate of trust and reciprocal respect, between Israelis and Palestinians, so that peace may reign in the Holy City and in the entire region.

Lord, aid Lebanon, which still seeks stability and unity, so that divisions may be overcome and all citizens cooperate for the common good of the country.

Be mindful of the beloved people of Tunisia, and in particular the young and those suffering from social and economic hardship, so that they may not lose hope and may work together to build a future of peace and fraternity.

Turn your gaze to Haiti, which has long experienced a grave social, economic and humanitarian crisis, and support the efforts of political actors and the international community to seek a definitive solution to the many problems that afflict that sorely tried people.

Consolidate the processes of peace and reconciliation undertaken in Ethiopia and in South Sudan, and grant an end to violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Sustain, Lord, the Christian communities that today celebrate Easter in particular circumstances, as in Nicaragua and Eritrea, and remember all who are prevented from freely and publicly professing their faith. Grant consolation to victims of international terrorism, especially in Burkina Faso, Mali, Mozambique and Nigeria.

Help Myanmar to pursue paths of peace, and enlighten the hearts of leaders, so that the deeply afflicted Rohingya may encounter justice.

Comfort refugees, deportees, political prisoners and migrants, especially those who are most vulnerable, as well as the victims of hunger, poverty and the dire effects of the drug trade, human trafficking and all other forms of slavery. Lord, inspire the leaders of nations to ensure that no man or woman may encounter discrimination and be violated in his or her dignity; that in full respect for human rights and democracy these social wounds may be healed; that the common good of the citizenry may be pursued always and solely; and that security and the conditions needed for dialogue and peaceful coexistence may be guaranteed.

Brothers, sisters, may we rediscover the enjoyment of the journey, quicken the heartbeat of hope and experience a foretaste of the beauty of heaven! Today, let us summon the energy to advance in goodness towards Goodness itself, which never disappoints. If, as one of the ancient Fathers once wrote, “the greatest sin is not to believe in the power of the resurrection” (SAINT ISAAC OF NINEVEH, Sermones Ascetici, I, 5), today let us believe and profess: “Christ is truly risen from the dead!” (Sequence). We believe in you, Lord Jesus. We believe that, with you, hope is reborn and the journey continues. May you, the Lord of life, encourage us on our journey and repeat to us, as you did to the disciples on the evening of Easter: “Peace be with you! Peace be with you! Peace be with you!” (Jn 19:21).

09.04.23

The night is drawing to a close and the first light of dawn is appearing upon the horizon as the women set out toward Jesus’ tomb. They make their way forward, bewildered and dismayed, their hearts overwhelmed with grief at the death that took away their Beloved. Yet upon arriving and seeing the empty tomb, they turn around and retrace their steps. They leave the tomb behind and run to the disciples to proclaim a change of course: Jesus is risen and awaits them in Galilee. In their lives, those women experienced Easter as a Pasch, a passage. They pass from walking sorrowfully towards the tomb to running back with joy to the disciples to tell them not only that the Lord is risen, but also that they are to set out immediately to reach a destination, Galilee. There they will meet the Risen Lord. The rebirth of the disciples, the resurrection of their hearts, passes through Galilee. Let us enter into this journey of the disciples from the tomb to Galilee.

The Gospel tells us that the women went “to see the tomb” (Mt 28:1). They think that they will find Jesus in the place of death and that everything is over, forever. Sometimes we too may think that the joy of our encounter with Jesus is something belonging to the past, whereas the present consists mostly of sealed tombs: tombs of disappointment, bitterness and distrust, of the dismay of thinking that “nothing more can be done”, “things will never change”, “better to live for today”, since “there is no certainty about tomorrow”. If we are prey to sorrow, burdened by sadness, laid low by sin, embittered by failure or troubled by some problem, we also know the bitter taste of weariness and the absence of joy.

At times, we may simply feel weary about our daily routine, tired of taking risks in a cold, hard world where only the clever and the strong seem to get ahead. At other times, we may feel helpless and discouraged before the power of evil, the conflicts that tear relationships apart, the attitudes of calculation and indifference that seem to prevail in society, the cancer of corruption – there is a great deal of it, the spread of injustice, the icy winds of war. Then too, we may have come face to face with death, because it robbed us of the presence of our loved ones or because we brushed up against it in illness or a serious setback. Then it is easy to yield to disillusionment, once the wellspring of hope has dried up. In these or similar situations – each of us knows our own plights, our paths come to a halt before a row of tombs, and we stand there, filled with sorrow and regret, alone and powerless, repeating the question, “Why?” That chain of “why”…

The women at Easter, however, do not stand frozen before the tomb; rather, the Gospel tells us, “they went away quickly from the tomb, fearful yet overjoyed, and ran to announce this to his disciples” (v. 8). They bring the news that will change life and history forever: Christ is risen! (v. 6). At the same time, they remember to convey the Lord’s summons to the disciples to go to Galilee, for there they will see him (cf. v. 7). Let us ask ourselves today, brothers and sisters: what does it mean to go to Galilee? Two things: on the one hand, to leave the enclosure of the Upper Room and go to the land of the Gentiles (cf. Mt 4:15), to come forth from hiding and to open themselves up to mission, to leave fear behind and to set out for the future. On the other hand, and this is very beautiful, to return to the origins, for it was precisely in Galilee that everything began. There the Lord had met and first called the disciples. So, to go to Galilee means to return to the grace of the beginnings, to regain the memory that regenerates hope, the “memory of the future” bestowed on us by the Risen One.

This, then, is what the Pasch of the Lord accomplishes: it motivates us to move forward, to leave behind our sense of defeat, to roll away the stone of the tombs in which we often imprison our hope, and to look with confidence to the future, for Christ is risen and has changed the direction of history. Yet, to do this, the Pasch of the Lord takes us back to the grace of our own past; it brings us back to Galilee, where our love story with Jesus began, where the first call took place. In other words, it asks us to relive that moment, that situation, that experience in which we met the Lord, experienced his love and received a radiantly new way of seeing ourselves, the world around us and the mystery of life itself. Brothers and sisters, to rise again, to start anew, to take up the journey, we always need to return to Galilee, that is, to go back, not to an abstract or ideal Jesus, but to the living, concrete and palpable memory of our first encounter with him. Yes, to go forward we need to go back, to remember; to have hope, we need to revive our memory. This is what we are asked to do: to remember and go forward! If you recover that first love, the wonder and joy of your encounter with God, you will keep advancing. So remember, and keep moving forward.

Remember your own Galilee and walk towards it, for it is the “place” where you came to know Jesus personally, where he stopped being just another personage from a distant past, but a living person: not some distant God but the God who is at your side, who more than anyone else knows you and loves you. Brother, sister, remember Galilee, your Galilee, and your call. Remember the Word of God who at a precise moment spoke directly to you. Remember that powerful experience of the Spirit; that great joy of forgiveness experienced after that one confession; that intense and unforgettable moment of prayer; that light that was kindled within you and changed your life; that encounter, that pilgrimage... Each of us knows where our Galilee is located. Each of us knows the place of his or her interior resurrection, that beginning and foundation, the place where things changed. We cannot leave this in the past; the Risen Lord invites us to return there to celebrate Easter. Remember your Galilee. Remind yourself. Today, relive that memory. Return to that first encounter. Think back on what it was like, reconstruct the context, time and place. Remember the emotions and sensations; see the colours and savour the taste of it. For it is when you forgot that first love, when you failed to remember that first encounter, that the dust began to settle on your heart. That is when you experienced sorrow and, like the disciples, you saw the future as empty, like a tomb with a stone sealing off all hope. Yet today, brother, sister, the power of Easter summons you to roll away every stone of disappointment and mistrust. The Lord is an expert in rolling back the stones of sin and fear. He wants to illuminate your sacred memory, your most beautiful memory, and to make you relive that first encounter with him. Remember and keep moving forward. Return to him and rediscover the grace of God’s resurrection within you! Return to Galilee. Return to your Galilee.

Dear brothers and sisters, let us follow Jesus to Galilee, encounter him and worship him there, where he is waiting for each of us. Let us revive the beauty of that moment when we realized that he is alive and we made him the Lord of our lives. Let us return to Galilee, the Galilee of our first love. Let each of us return to his or her own Galilee, to the place where we first encountered him. Let us rise to new life!

08.04.23

What attracts our attention is how Jesus, just the day before is crucified, accomplishes this deed. Foot washing was customary at that time because the streets were dusty. People would come in from outside and, on entering a house, before dining, before gathering, they would wash their feet. But who would wash their feet? The slaves, the slaves – because this was work relegated to slaves.

Let us imagine how the disciples were astonished when they saw Jesus beginning to perform this task fit for slaves… He wanted to make them understand the message for the next day when he would die like a slave to pay the debt for all us. If we were to listen to these things from Jesus, life would be so beautiful because we would hurry to help each other out instead of getting the best of others, to take advantage of each other, the way con artists teach us. It is very beautiful to help each other, to give a hand – these are human universal gestures that are born from a noble heart. And with this celebration today, Jesus wants to teach us this: the nobility of the heart. Each one of us could say: “But if the Pope only knew the things I have inside….” But Jesus knows that, and he loves us just like we are! And he washes each of our feet. Jesus is never shocked at our weaknesses. He is never astonished, because he has already paid. He just wants to accompany us; he wants to take us by the hand so that life won’t be so harsh for us.

I will perform the same deed of the washing of the feet, which is not something folkloric, no. We can all think of it as a gesture that tells us how we should treat each other. In society, we see how many people take advantage of others; how many people are in a corner and can’t get out…. How many injustices, how many people are without jobs, how many people work and are paid half, how many people have no money to purchase medicine, how many families are destroyed, so many awful things….

And none of us can say, “Thanks to God I am not like, you know”. “If I am not like that it is because of the grace of God!” Each one of us can slip, every one of us. And this awareness, this certainty that each of us can slip, is what gives us the dignity – listen to the word – the “dignity” of being sinners. And Jesus wants us like this, and because of this he wanted to wash his disciples’ feet and say: “I came to save you, to serve you”.

Now, I will do the same thing as a memory of what Jesus taught us, to help each other and in this way, life is more beautiful and we can carry on like this. During the washing of the feet – I hope I succeed in doing it because I cannot walk that well – but during the washing of the feet, think about this: “Jesus has washed my feet. Jesus has saved me, and I have this difficulty now”. But it will pass, but the Lord is always next to you, he never abandons, never. Think about all this.

06.04.23 Ls

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me” (Lk 4:18). Jesus began his preaching with this verse, which also begins today’s first reading (cf. Is 61:1). At the beginning, then, the Spirit of the Lord is present.

Dear brothers in the priesthood, today I would like to reflect with you on the Holy Spirit. For without the Spirit of the Lord, there can be no Christian life; without his anointing, there can be no holiness. He is at the centre and it is fitting that today, on the birthday of the priesthood, we acknowledge his presence at the origin of our own ministry, and the life and vitality of every priest. Holy Mother Church teaches us to profess that the Holy Spirit is the “giver of life”. Jesus told us: “it is the Spirit that gives life” ( Jn 6:63). His teaching was taken up by the apostle Paul, who wrote that “the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” ( 2 Cor 3:6) and who spoke of the “law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus” ( Rom 8:2). Without the Holy Spirit, the Church would not be the living Bride of Christ, but, at most, a religious association – more or less good, not the Body of Christ, but a temple built by human hands. How then are we to build up the Church, if not beginning with the fact that we are “temples of the Holy Spirit” who “dwells in us” (cf. 1 Cor 6:19; 3:16)? We cannot lock the Spirit out of the house, or park him in some devotional zone, no, he has to be at the centre! Each day we need to say: “Come, for without your strength, we are lost”. 

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me. Every one of us can say this, not out of presumption, but as a reality. For all Christians, and priests in particular, can apply to themselves the words that follow: “because the Lord has anointed me” (Is 61:1). Dear brothers, apart from any merit of our own, and by sheer grace, we have received an anointing that has made us fathers and shepherds among the holy People of God. Let us reflect, then, on this aspect of the Spirit: his anointing.

After his initial anointing, which took place in the womb of Mary, the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus in the Jordan. Following that, as Saint Basil explains, “every act of Christ was performed with the co-presence of the Holy Spirit”.  In the power of that latter anointing, Jesus preached and worked signs; thanks to that anointing, “power came out from him and healed all” ( Lk 6:19). Jesus and the Spirit always work together, like two hands of the Father – as Irenaeus said – that reach out to embrace us and raise us up. By those hands, our own hands were sealed, anointed by the Spirit of Christ. Yes, brothers, the Lord has not only chosen us and called us to go to that place or another: he has poured out upon us the anointing of the Holy Spirit, the same Spirit who descended upon the apostles. Brothers, we are “the anointed”.

Let us now turn our attention to them, to the apostles. Jesus chose them and at his call, they left their boats, their nets and their homes and so on… The anointing of the Word changed their lives. With great enthusiasm, they followed the Master and began to preach, convinced that they would go on to accomplish even greater things. Then came the Passover. Everything seemed to come to a halt: they even denied and abandoned their Master. We should not be afraid. We are courageous when reading about our life and our failures, even denying and abandoning the Master, as Peter did. They came to grips with their own failure; they realized that they had not understood him. The words uttered by Peter in the courtyard of the high priest following the Last Supper – “I do not know this man” (Mk 14:71) – were not only an impulsive attempt at self-defense, but an admission of spiritual ignorance. He and the others perhaps expected a life of triumph behind the Messiah who drew crowds and worked wonders, but they failed to understand the scandal of the cross, which caused their certainties to collapse. Jesus knew that, on their own, they would not have succeeded, and so he promised to send them the Paraclete. It was precisely that “second anointing”, at Pentecost, that changed the disciples and led them to shepherd no longer themselves but the Lord’s flock. Here is the conflict to resolve: Am I a pastor of the Lord’s flock or of myself? The Spirit is there to show us the way. It was that anointing with fire that extinguished a “piety” focused on themselves and their own abilities. After receiving the Spirit, Peter’s fear and wavering dissipated; James and John, with a burning desire to give their lives, no longer sought places of honour (cf. Mk 10:35-45) which is careerism, brothers; the others who had huddled fearfully in the Upper Room, went forth into the world as apostles. The Spirit changes our heart and points it in a different direction.

Dear brothers, something similar happens in our own priestly and apostolic lives. We too experienced an initial anointing, which began with a loving call that captivated our hearts and set us out on the journey; the power of the Holy Spirit descended upon our genuine enthusiasm and consecrated us.  Later, in God’s good time, each of us experienced a Passover, representing the moment of truth. A time of crisis which took various forms. Sooner or later, we all experience disappointment, frustration and our own weakness; our ideals seem to recede in the face of reality, a certain force of habit takes over, and difficulties that once seemed unimaginable appear to challenge our fidelity.  For the anointed, this stage – this temptation, this trail which we have experienced, we are experiencing or will experience – is a watershed. We can emerge from it badly, drifting towards mediocrity and settling for a dreary routine, in which three dangerous temptations can arise. The temptation of compromise, where we are content just to do what has to be done; the temptation of surrogates, where to find satisfaction we look not to our anointing, but elsewhere; and the temptation of discouragement – which is very common – where dissatisfaction leads to inertia. This is the great danger: while outward appearances remain intact –“I am a priest, I am priest” – we close in upon ourselves and are content just to get by. The fragrance of our anointing no longer wafts through our lives; our hearts no longer expand but shrivel, disillusioned and disenchanted. This is the problem, you know? When the priesthood slowly degenerates into clericalism and the priest forgets that he is a pastor of the people and becomes instead a cleric of the state.

Yet this crisis also has the potential to be a turning point in our priesthood, the “decisive stage of the spiritual life, in which the ultimate choice has to be made between Jesus and the world, between heroic charity and mediocrity, between the cross and comfort, between holiness and dutiful fidelity to our religious obligations”. At the end of this celebration, they will give you a gift, a classic, a book that talks about this problem: “The second calling”. It is a classic by Father Voillaume who touches on this problem. Read it. All of us need to reflect on this moment in our priesthood. It is that grace-filled moment when, like the disciples at Easter, we are called to be “sufficiently humble to admit that we have been won over by the suffering and crucified Christ, and to set out on a new journey, that of the Spirit, of faith and of a love that is strong, yet without illusions”.  It is the kairos that enables us to realize that “it is not enough to abandon boat and nets in order to follow Jesus for certain time; it also demands going to Calvary, learning its lesson and receiving its fruit, and persevering with the help of the Holy Spirit to the end of a life meant to conclude in the perfection of divine charity”.  With the help of the Holy Spirit: for us as for the apostles, it is the time of a “second anointing”, the time of our second calling, to which we have to listen; the second anointing in which the Spirit is poured out no longer on the enthusiasm of our hopes and dreams, but on the freedom of our concrete situation. An anointing that penetrates to the depths of our reality, where the Spirit anoints our weaknesses, our weariness, our inner poverty. An anointing that brings a new fragrance: that of the Spirit, not of ourselves. At this very moment, inwardly, I am thinking of some of you who are in crisis – let’s say – who are disoriented and do not know how find their way, how to get back on the road of this second anointing of the Spirit. To these brothers – of whom I am thinking – I simply say: courage, the Lord is greater than your weaknesses, your sins. Trust the Lord and let yourself be called a second time, this time with the anointing of the Holy Spirit. A double life will not help you; not a chance, throw everything out the window. Look ahead, let yourself be caressed by the anointing of the Holy Spirit.

This happens when we take the mature step of admitting the reality of our own weakness. That is what “the Spirit of truth (Jn 16:13) tells us to do; he prompts us to look deep within and to ask: Does my fulfilment depend on my abilities, my position, the compliments I receive, my promotions, the respect of my superiors or coworkers, the comforts with which I surround myself? Or on the anointing that spreads its fragrance everywhere in my life? Dear brothers, priestly maturity comes from the Holy Spirit and is achieved when he becomes the protagonist in our lives. Once that happens, everything turns around, even disappointments and bitter experiences – and also sins – since we are no longer trying to find happiness by adjusting details, but by giving ourselves completely to the Lord who anointed us and who wants that anointing to penetrate to the depths of our being. Brothers, let us rediscover that the spiritual life becomes liberating and joyful, once we are no longer concerned to save appearances and make quick fixes, but leave the initiative to the Spirit and, in openness to his plans, show our willingness to serve wherever and however we are asked. Our priesthood does not grow by quick fixes but by an overflow of grace!

If we allow the Spirit of Truth to act within us, we will preserve his anointing, because the various untruths – the hypocrisy of clericalism – with which we are tempted to live will come to light immediately. And the Spirit who “cleanses what is unclean”, will tirelessly suggest to us “not to defile our anointing”, even in the least. We think of that phrase of the Preacher, who says that “dying flies spoil the sweetness of the ointment” (10:1). It is true, every form of duplicity – especially clerical duplicity – that insinuates itself is dangerous: it must not be tolerated, but brought into the light of the Spirit. For “the heart is devious above all else; it is perverse, and who can heal it?” ( Jer 17:9). The Holy Spirit, he alone, heals our infidelities (cf. Hos 14:4). For us, this an unavoidable struggle: it is indispensable, as Saint Gregory the Great wrote, that “those who proclaim the word of God, must first be concerned with their own way of life; then, based on his own life, he can learn what to say and how to say it… Let no one presume to say more than what first he heard within”. The Spirit is that interior teacher to whom we must listen, recognizing that he desires to anoint every part of us. Brothers, let us preserve our anointing, invoking the Spirit not as an occasional act of piety, but as the breath of each day. Come, come, and preserve our anointing. Consecrated by him, I am called to immerse myself in him, to make his life penetrate my darkness – and we all have this darkness – so that I can rediscover the truth of who and what I am.  Let us allow ourselves to be impelled by him to combat the untruths that struggle within us. And let us allow ourselves to be reborn from him through adoration, for when we adore the Lord, he pours forth into our hearts his Spirit.

“The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me”, so the prophecy continues, to bring good news, liberty, healing and grace (cf. Is 61:1-2; Lk 4:18-19): in a word, to bring harmony wherever it is lacking. As Saint Basil said: “the Spirit is harmony”, he is the one that brings harmony. After speaking to you about anointing, I would like to say something to you about the harmony that is its consequence. Because the Holy Spirit is harmony. Above all in heaven: Saint Basil notes that “all supercelestial and unspeakable harmony in the service of God and in the mutual symphony of the supercosmic powers, would be impossible to preserve, if not for the authority of the Spirit”.  As well as on earth: in the Church, the Spirit is that “divine and musical harmony” that binds everything together. Let us think of a Presbyterate without harmony, without the Spirit: it would not work. He awakens the diversity of charisms and brings them into unity; he creates concord based not on uniformity, but on the creativity of charity. In this way, he creates harmony from multiplicity. In this way, he creates harmony in the Presbyterate. At the time of the Second Vatican Council, itself a gift of the Spirit, a theologian published a study in which he spoke of the Spirit not as individual, but as plural. He suggested thinking of the Spirit as a divine person who is not only singular but “plural”, as the “We of God”, the “We” of the Father and of the Son, since he is their bond. The Holy Spirit is in himself concord, communion and harmony. I remember when I read this theological treatise – it was when I was studying theology – I was scandalized: it seemed like heresy, because in our training we did not quite understand who the Holy Spirit was.

To create harmony is what the Spirit desires, above all through those upon whom he has poured out his anointing. Brothers, building harmony among ourselves is not simply a good way of improving the functioning of ecclesial structures, it is not the minuet dance, or a matter of strategy or politeness: it is an intrinsic demand of the life of the Spirit. We sin against the Spirit who is communion whenever we become, even unintentionally, instruments of division. For example, I would mention again the topic of gossip. When we become instruments of division we sin against the Spirit. And whenever we play the game of the enemy, who never comes out into the open, who loves gossip and insinuation, foments parties and cliques, fuels nostalgia for times past, distrust, pessimism and fear. Let us take care, please, not to defile the anointing of the Holy Spirit and the robe of Holy Mother Church with disunity, polarization or lack of charity and communion. Let us remember that the Spirit, as “the We of God”, prefers the “shape” of community: willingness with regard to one’s own needs, obedience with regard to one’s own tastes, humility with regard to one’s own claims.

Harmony is not one virtue among others; it is something more. As Saint Gregory the Great writes: “the worth of the virtue of concord is shown by the fact that without it, the other virtues have no value whatsoever”.  Let us help one another, brothers, to preserve harmony – this is the task – starting not from others but each of us from himself. Let us ask ourselves: In my words, in my comments, in what I say and write, is there the seal of the Spirit or that of the world? Do I think about the kindness of the priest – but more often than not, we priests, we are rude – let us think about the kindness of the priest: if people see, in us too, people who are dissatisfied and discontented bachelors, who criticize and point fingers, where else will they find harmony? How many people fail to approach us, or keep at a distance, because in the Church they feel unwelcomed and unloved, regarded with suspicion and judged? In God’s name, let us be welcoming and forgiving, always! And let us remember that being irritable and full of complaints does not produce good fruits, but spoils our preaching, since it is a counter-witness to God, who is communion in harmony. Above all, it displeases greatly the Holy Spirit, whom the apostle Paul urges us not to grieve (cf. Eph 4:30).

Dear brothers, I leave you with these thoughts that come from my heart, and I conclude with two simple and important words: Thank you. Thank you for your witness and for your service. Thank you for the hidden good you do, and for the forgiveness and consolation that you bestow in God’s name. Always forgive, please, do not withhold forgiveness. Thank you for your ministry, which is often carried out with great effort, with little recognition and is not always understood. Brothers, may the Spirit of God, who does not disappoint those who trust in him, fill you with peace and bring to conclusion the good work he began in you, so that you may be prophetic witnesses of his anointing and apostles of harmony.

06.04.23 cm e

Excerpt below, for the full transcript click on the picture link above

This past Sunday, the Liturgy had us listen to the Passion of the Lord. It ended with these words: “They sealed the stone” (cf. Mt 27:66). Everything seemed over. For the disciples, that boulder signified the final end of their hope. The Teacher was crucified, killed in the cruelest and most humiliating manner, hung upon the infamous gallows outside the city – a public failure, the worst possible ending, it was the worst at that time. Now for us today, there is nothing entirely strange regarding the discouragement that oppressed the disciples. Gloomy thoughts and feelings of frustration accumulate in us as well. Why is there so much indifference toward God? This is interesting: Why is there so much evil in the world? Well, look, there is evil in the world! Why do inequalities continue to increase and why is that long-awaited peace not arriving? Why are we so attached to war, to treating each other badly? In each person’s heart, how many expectations have faded; how many delusions there are! And again, there is that feeling that times gone by were better and that in the world, perhaps even in the Church, things are not going the way they once did…. In short, even today, hope sometimes seems to be sealed behind the stone of mistrust. And I invite each one of you to think: Where is your hope? Is your hope alive, or have you sealed it up there, or have you put it there in a drawer, like a memory? Does your hope push you to walk or is it a romantic memory, as if it is something that doesn’t exist. Where is your hope today?

One image remained fixed in the minds of the disciples: the cross. That is where everything ended.That is where the end of everything was centred. But in a little while, they would discover a new beginning right there, in the cross. Dear brothers and sisters, this is how God’s hope germinates. It is born and reborn in the black holes of our disappointed expectations – and hope, true hope,instead, never disappoints. Let us think precisely about the cross: out of the most terrible instrument of torture, God wrought the greatest sign of his love. Having become the tree of life, that wood of death reminds us that God’s beginnings often begin with our ends. Thus, he loves to work wonders. So today, let us look at the tree of the cross so that hope might germinate in us – that everyday virtue, that silent, humble virtue, but also that virtue that keeps us on our feet, that helps us move forward. It is not possible to live without hope. Let us think: Where is my hope? Today, let us look at the tree of the cross so that hope might germinate in us…that we might be healed of our sadness. And how many sad people there are. When I used to be able to go out onto the streets, I cannot do it now because they do not allow me, but when I could go out onto the streets in another diocese, I used to like watching people’s faces. How many sad faces! Sad people, people talking to themselves, people walking alone with their cell phones, but without peace, without hope. And where is your hope today? It takes a bit of hope, right? to be healed from the sadness that makes us ill – there is so much sadness – to be healed from the bitterness with which we pollute the Church and world. Brothers and sisters, let us look there, at the crucifix. And what do we see? We see Jesus naked, Jesus stripped, Jesus wounded, Jesus tormented. Is it the end of everything? That’s where our hope is.

In these two aspects, let us then grasp how hope, which seems to have died, is reborn. Firstly, let us see Jesus stripped of his clothing. In fact, “And when they had crucified him, they divided his garments among them by casting lots” (v. 35). God is stripped – He who has everything allowed Himself to be stripped of everything. But that humiliation is the path of our redemption. This is how God overcomes our appearances. Indeed, we find it difficult to bare ourselves, to be truthful. We always try to cover the truth because we do not like it. We clothe ourselves with outward appearances that we look for and take good care of, masks to disguise ourselves and to appear better than we are. This is a bit like the “make-up” attitude: interior make-up, to seem better than others…. We think it is important to show off, to appear like this so others will speak well of us. And we adorn ourselves with appearances, we adorn ourselves with appearances, with unnecessary things. But we do not find peace this way. Then the make-up goes away and you look at yourself in the mirror with the ugly, but true, face you have – the one that God loves – not the one with make-up on. And stripped of everything, Jesus reminds us that hope is reborn by being truthful about ourselves – to tell ourselves the truth – by letting go of duplicity, by freeing ourselves from peacefully co-existing with our falsity. Sometimes, we are so used to telling ourselves lies that we live with the lies as if they are truth, and we end up being poisoned by our own falsity. This is what is needed: to return to the heart, to the essentials, to a simple life, stripped of so many useless things that are surrogates of hope. Today, when everything is complex and we risk losing a sense of meaning, we need simplicity, we need to rediscover the value of sobriety, the value of renunciation, to clean up what is polluting our hearts and makes them sad. Each one of us can think of something useless that we can free ourselves from to find ourselves again. Think about how many things are useless. Here, fifteen days ago at Santa Marta, where I live – it is a hotel for a lot of people – the idea circulated that for this Holy Week it would be good to look in our closets and get rid of things, to give away the things we have that we don’t use. You cannot imagine the number of things! It’s good to get rid of useless things. And this went to the poor, to the people in need. We too, how many useless things we have inside our hearts – and outside as well. Look at your closets: look at them. This is useful, this is useless…and do some cleaning there. Look at the closet of your soul – you laugh, right? It’s true, it’s true. Look at the closet of your soul – how many useless things you have, how many stupid illusions. Let us return to simplicity, to things that are true, that don’t need to be made-up. What a good exercise!

Let us direct our second glance to the Crucifix and we see Jesus who is wounded. The cross displays the nails that pierce his hands and feet, his open side. But to the wounds in his body are added those of his soul. How much anguish, Jesus is alone, betrayed, handed over and denied by his own – by his friends and even his disciples – condemned by the religious and civil powers, excommunicated, Jesus even feels abandoned by God (cf. v. 46). In addition, the reason for his condemnation appears on the cross: “This is Jesus, the King of the Jews” (v. 37). This is a mockery: He, who had fled when they wanted to make him king (cf. Jn 6:15), is now condemned for having made himself king. Even though he had committed no crime, he was placed in the middle of two criminals, and they prefer the violent Barabbas over him (cf. Mt 27:15-21). In the end, Jesus is wounded in body and in soul. I ask myself: In what way does this help our hope? In this way, what does Jesus, naked, stripped of everything, of everything, say to my hope, how can this help me?

We too are wounded – who isn’t in life? And they are often hidden wounds we hide out of embarrassment. Who does not bear the scars of past choices, of misunderstandings, of sorrows that remain inside and are difficult to overcome? But also of wrongs suffered, sharp words, unmerciful judgements? God does not hide the wounds that pierced his body and soul, from our eyes. He shows them so we can see that a new passage can be opened with Easter: to make holes of lights out of our own wounds. “But, Your Holiness, you are exaggerating”, someone might say to me. No, it’s true. Try it, try it. Try doing it. Think about your wounds, the ones you alone know about, that everyone has hidden in their heart. And look at the Lord and you will see, you will see how holes of light come out of those wounds. Jesus does not incriminate on the cross, but loves. He loves and forgives those who hurt him (cf. Lk 23:34). Thus, he converts evil into good; thus, he converts and transforms sorrow into love.

Brothers and sisters, the point is not whether we are wounded a little or a lot in life, the point is what to do with my wounds –the little ones, the big ones, the ones that leave their mark forever on my body, on my soul. What can I do with my wounds? What can you, you, you, do with your wounds? “No, Father, I don’t have any wounds” – “Be careful, think twice before saying this”. And I ask you: what do you do with your wounds, with the ones only you know about? You can allow them to infect you with resentment and sadness, or I can instead unite them to those of Jesus, so that my wounds too might become luminous.Think of how many young people, how many young people, do not tolerate their own wounds and look for a way of salvation in suicide. Today, in our cities, so many young people see no other way out, they have no hope, and prefer to get high using drugs, to forget…poor people. Think about this. And you, what is the drug you use to hide your wounds? Our wounds can become springs of hope when, instead of feeling sorry for ourselves or hiding them, we dry the tears shed by others; when, instead of nourishing resentment for what was robbed of us, we take care of what others are lacking; when, instead of dwelling on ourselves, we bend over those who suffer; when, instead of being thirsty for love, we quench the thirst of those in need of us. For it is only if we stop thinking of ourselves, that we will find ourselves again. But if we continue to think of ourselves, we will not find ourselves anymore. And it is by doing this, the Scriptures say, that our wound is healed quickly (cf. Is 58:8), and hope flourishes anew. Think about this: What can I do for others? I am wounded. I am wounded by sin, I am wounded by my past, everyone has their own wound. What can I do? Lick my wounds for the rest of my life? Or can I look at the wounds others have and go with the wounded experience of my life to heal, to help others? This is today’s challenge for all of you, for each of you, for each one of us. May the Lord help us move forward.

05.04.23 e

Dear brothers and sisters!

I greet all of you, people from Rome and pilgrims, especially those who have come from far away. I thank you for your participation and also for your prayers, which intensified during these past days. Thank you indeed!

I extend a special blessing to the Caravan of Peace that, during these days, departed from Italy bound for Ukraine, promoted by a variety of associations: Pope John XXIII, FOCSIV, Pro Civitate Christiana, Pax Christi and others. Along with basic necessities, they are bringing the closeness of the people of Italy to the battered people of Ukraine, and today, they are offering olive branches, symbols of the peace of Christ. Let us unite ourselves to this gesture with our prayer, which will be more intense during the days of Holy Week.

Brothers and sisters, we have begun Holy Week with this celebration. I invite all of you to live it as the tradition of the holy, faithful people of God teaches us, that is, accompanying the Lord Jesus with faith and love. Let us learn from our Mother, the Virgin Mary. She followed her Son with the closeness of her heart. She was of one soul with Him. And, together with him, even though not understanding everything, she abandoned herself completely to the will of God the Father. May Our Lady help us stay close to Jesus, present in the people who suffer, are cast out, abandoned. May Our Lady lead us by the hand to Jesus present in these people.

I wish everyone a good journey toward Easter!

02.04.23 a

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46).  This is the cry that today’s liturgy has us repeat in the responsorial psalm (cf. Ps 22:2), the only cry that Jesus makes from the cross in the Gospel we have heard.  Those words bring us to the very heart of Christ’s passion, the culmination of the sufferings he endured for our salvation.  “Why have you forsaken me?”.

The sufferings of Jesus were many, and whenever we listen to the account of the Passion, they pierce our hearts.  There were sufferings of the body: let us think of the slaps and beatings, the flogging and the crowning with thorns, and in the end, the cruelty of the crucifixion.  There were also sufferings of the soul: the betrayal of Judas, the denials of Peter, the condemnation of the religious and civil authorities, the mockery of the guards, the jeering at the foot of the cross, the rejection of the crowd, utter failure and the flight of the disciples.  Yet, amid all these sorrows, Jesus remained certain of one thing: the closeness of the Father.  Now, however, the unthinkable has taken place.  Before dying, he cries out: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”  The forsakenness of Jesus.

This is the most searing of all sufferings, the suffering of the spirit.  At his most tragic hour, Jesus experiences abandonment by God. Prior to that moment, he had never called the Father by his generic name, “God”.  To convey the impact of this, the Gospel also reports his words in Aramaic.  These are the only words of Jesus from the cross that have come down to us in the original language.  The real event is the extreme abasement, being forsaken by the Father, forsaken by God.  We find it hard even to grasp what great suffering he embraced out of love for us.  He sees the gates of heaven close, he finds himself at the bitter edge, the shipwreck of life, the collapse of certainty.  And he cries out: “Why?”  A “why” that embraces every other “why” ever spoken.  “Why, God?”.

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”  In the Bible, the word “forsake” is powerful.  We hear it at moments of extreme pain: love that fails, or is rejected or betrayed; children who are rejected and aborted; situations of repudiation, the lot of widows and orphans; broken marriages, forms of social exclusion, injustice and oppression; the solitude of sickness.  In a word, in the drastic severing of the bonds that unite us to others.  There, this word is spoken: “abandonment”.  Christ brought all of this to the cross; upon his shoulders, he bore the sins of the world.  And at the supreme moment, Jesus, the only-begotten, beloved Son of the Father, experienced a situation utterly alien to his very being: abandonment, the distance of God.

Why did it have to come to this?  He did it for us.  There is no other answer.  For us.  Brothers and sisters, today this is not merely a show.  Every one of us, hearing of Jesus’ abandonment, can say: for me.  This abandonment is the price he paid for me.  He became one with each of us in order to be completely and definitively one with us to the very end.  He experienced abandonment in order not to leave us prey to despair, in order to stay at our side forever.  He did this for me, for you, because whenever you or I or anyone else seems pinned to the wall, lost in a blind alley, plunged into the abyss of abandonment, sucked into a whirlwind of so many “whys” without an answer, there can still be a hope: Jesus himself, for you, for me.  It is not the end, because Jesus was there and even now, he is at your side.  He endured the distance of abandonment in order to take up into his love every possible distance that we can feel.  So that each of us might say: in my failings, and each of us has failed many times, in my desolation, whenever I feel betrayed or betrayed others, whenever I feel cast aside or have cast aside others, whenever I feel forsaken or have abandoned others, let us think of Jesus, who was abandoned, betrayed and cast aside.  There, we find him.  When I feel lost and confused, when I feel that I can’t go on, he is beside me.  Amid all my unanswered questions “why...?”, he is there.

That is how the Lord saves us, from within our questioning “why?”  From within that questioning, he opens the horizon of hope that does not disappoint.  On the cross, even as he felt utter abandonment – this is the ultimate end – Jesus refused to yield to despair; instead, he prayed and trusted.  He cried out his “why?” in the words of the Psalm (22:2), and commended himself into the hands of the Father, despite how distant he felt him to be (cf. Lk 23:46) or rather, whom he did not feel, for instead he felt himself abandoned.  In the hour of his abandonment, Jesus continued to trust.  At the hour of abandonment, he continued to love his disciples who had fled, leaving him alone.  In his abandonment he forgave those who crucified him (v. 34).  Here we see the abyss of our many evils immersed in a greater love, with the result that our isolation becomes fellowship.  

Brothers and sisters, a love like this, embracing us totally and to the very end, the love of Jesus, can turn our stony hearts into hearts of flesh.  His is a love of mercy, tenderness and compassion.  This is God’s style: closeness, compassion and tenderness.  God is like this.  Christ, in his abandonment, stirs us to seek him and to love him and those who are themselves abandoned.  For in them we see not only people in need, but Jesus himself, abandoned: Jesus, who saved us by descending to the depths of our human condition.  He is with each of them, abandoned even to death… I think of the German so-called “street person”, who died under the colonnade, alone and abandoned.  He is Jesus for each of us.  So many need our closeness, so many are abandoned.  I too need Jesus to caress me and draw close to me, and for this reason I go to find him in the abandoned, in the lonely.  He wants us to care for our brothers and sisters who resemble him most, those experiencing extreme suffering and solitude.  Today, dear brothers and sisters, their numbers are legion.  Entire peoples are exploited and abandoned; the poor live on our streets and we look the other way; there are migrants who are no longer faces but numbers; there are prisoners who are disowned; people written off as problems.  Countless other abandoned persons are in our midst, invisible, hidden, discarded with white gloves: unborn children, the elderly who live alone: they could perhaps be your father or mother, your grandfather or grandmother, left alone in retirement homes, the sick whom no one visits, the disabled who are ignored, and the young burdened by great interior emptiness, with no one prepared to listen to their cry of pain.  And they find no path other than suicide.  The abandoned of our day.  The “Christs” of our day.

Jesus, in his abandonment, asks us to open our eyes and hearts to all who find themselves abandoned.  For us, as disciples of the “forsaken” Lord, no man, woman or child can be regarded as an outcast, no one left to himself or herself.  Let us remember that the rejected and the excluded are living icons of Christ: they remind us of his reckless love, his forsakenness that delivers us from every form of loneliness and isolation.  Brothers and sisters, today let us implore this grace: to love Jesus in his abandonment and to love Jesus in the abandoned all around us.  Let us ask for the grace to see and acknowledge the Lord who continues to cry out in them.  May we not allow his voice to go unheard amid the deafening silence of indifference.  God has not left us alone; let us care, then, for those who feel alone and abandoned.  Then, and only then, will we be of one mind and heart with the one who, for our sake, “emptied himself” (Phil 2:7).  He emptied himself completely for us.

02.04.23 m