Dear brother Cardinals and Bishops,

Dear brothers and sisters!

Today we renew the beautiful custom, on the occasion of the Commemoration of all the faithful departed, of celebrating the Eucharist in memory of the Cardinals and Bishops who left us during the past year, and we offer it with great affection for the elected soul of Pope Francis, who passed after opening the Holy Door and imparting the Easter Blessing to Rome and the world. Thanks to the Jubilee, this celebration – the first for me – acquires a characteristic flavour – the flavour of Christian hope.

The Word of God we have just heard enlightens us. First and foremost, with a great biblical icon that, we might say, encapsulates the meaning of this Holy Year: the account by Luke of the disciples of Emmaus (Lk 24, 13-35). In it, we find a vivid representation of the pilgrimage of hope, which passes through the encounter with the Risen Christ. The starting point is the experience of death, and in its worst form: a violent death that kills the innocent and thus leaves us discouraged, disheartened and desperate. How many people – how many “little ones”! – even in our times suffer the trauma of this fearful death, disfigured by sin. For this death, we cannot and must not say “laudato si’”, “praise to You”, because God the Father does not want it, and he sent his Son to the world to free us from it. It is written: Christ had to endure these sufferings in order to enter into his glory (cf. Lk 24:26) and to give us eternal life. He alone can can bear upon himself and within himself this corrupt death without being corrupted by it. He alone has the words of eternal life (cf. Jn 6:68) – we confess this with trepidation here near the tomb of Saint Peter – and these words have the power to rekindle faith and hope in our hearts (cf. v. 32).

When Jesus takes the bread in his hands, which had been nailed to the cross, delivers the blessing, breaks the bread and offers it, the disciples’ eyes open, faith blossoms in their heart, and with faith, a new hope. Yes! It is no longer the hope they had before, and which they had lost. It is a new reality, a gift, a grace of the Risen One: it is paschal hope.

Just as the life of the Risen Jesus is no longer what it was before, but is entirely new, created by the Father with the power of the Spirit, so the hope of the Christian is not human hope, it is neither that of the Greeks nor that of the Jews, it is not based on the wisdom of philosophers or on the justice that comes from the law, but solely and totally on the fact that the Crucified One is risen and appeared to Simon (cf. Lk 24:34), to the women and to the other disciples. It is a hope that does not look to the earthly horizon, but beyond, to God, to that height and depth from which the Sun rose to enlighten those who are in darkness and in the shadow of death (cf. Lk 1:78-79).

Then, yes, we can sing: “Praised be You, my Lord, through our Sister Bodily Death”.[1] The love of the Crucified and Risen Christ has transfigured our death: He has turned it from an enemy into a sister, he has tamed it. And faced with it, we “may not grieve as others do who have no hope” (1 Ts 4:13). Certainly, we mourn when a loved one leaves us. We are distraught when a human being, especially a child, a “little one”, a fragile person, is snatched away by illness or, worse, by human violence. As Christians we are called to bear with Christ the burden of these crosses. But we are not as sad as those who have no hope, because even the most tragic death cannot prevent our Lord from welcoming our soul in his arms and transforming our mortal body, even the most disfigured, in the image of his glorious body (cf. Phil 3:21).

For this reason, Christians do not call burial places “necropolises” or “cities of the dead”, but “cemeteries”, which literally means “dormitories”, places where one rests awaiting resurrection. As the psalmist prophesies, “In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for thou alone, O Lord, makest me dwell in safety” (Ps 4:8).

Dear friends, beloved Pope Francis and the brother Cardinals and Bishops for whom we offer the Eucharistic sacrifice lived, bore witness to and taught this new, paschal hope. The Lord called to them and made them shepherds in his Church, and with their ministry they – to use the language of the Book of Daniel – “turned many to righteousness” (cf. Dn 12:3), that is, they led them on the path of the Gospel with the wisdom that comes from Christ, who for us became wisdom, justice, sanctification and redemption (cf. 1 Cor 1:30). May their souls be washed of every stain and may they shine like stars in heaven (cf. v. 3). And may their spiritual encouragement reach us, still pilgrims on earth, in the silence of prayer: “Hope in God; for I shall again praise Him, my help and my God” (Ps 42: 6, 12).

[1] Saint Francis of Assisi, Canticle of the Sun

03.11.25