(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis met with a group of 65 child refugees from Syria and Eritrea on Wednesday during his General Audience.
The children are staying in the small town of Castelnuovo di Porto, located 25 kilometres north of Rome.
The children were wearing shirts saying “Grazie Papa Francesco” [Thank you, Pope Francis], and gave the Holy Father a large teddy bear. They also held up a sign saying “Our house is where peace resides.”
Pope Francis washed the feet of refugees from the Centre for Asylum Seekers at Castelnuovo di Porto on Holy Thursday in March.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis this week embarks on a short pilgrimage to mark the 8 th centenary of the “Pardon of Assisi,” a feast which commemorates the establishment of a plenary indulgence for all who pass through the chapel where the Franciscan order was founded.
During his Aug. 4 pilgrimage , the Pope will visit the Porziuncola – a small chapel, located inside the larger Basilica of St Mary of the Angels.
In an interview with Vatican Radio, Minister General of the Order of Friars Minor, Fr Michael Anthony Perry, who will meet with the Holy Father during the pilgrimage, explained the meaning behind this feast .
Listen to Blandine Hugonnet’s interview with Fr Michael Perry, OFM:
“It was his own discovery of God forgiving him for his own sins,” he said. “And as he began to forgive himself and allowed God to forgive him, he found himself wanting to forgive others, and wanting to extend that to all people, even to his enemies.”
This message, which echoes out “from the Porziuncola,” Fr Perry said, invites “everyone to stop, take a moment, listen to God saying: I forgive you. I love you. Come back to me.”
The Franciscan priest added that while the significance of the message remains unchanged between the time of St Francis and today, what has changed is “our ability to heal or not to listen.”
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis renewed his condemnation of the holocaust on Wednesday, and decried once again the persistent violence in the world as a “piecemeal” world war. The Holy Father’s remarks came during the course of the General Audience on Wednesday – the first since suspending the weekly appointment with pilgrims and tourists for the month of July, and the first since his return from Poland and the 2016 edition of World Youth Day.
While in Poland, Pope Francis visited the extermination camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau, where German National Socialists murdered a million European Jews (one in every six victims of Shoah perished at Auschwitz) as part of their programme of Jewish extermination.
“The great silence of the visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau,” said Pope Francis, “was more eloquent than any word spoken could have been. In that silence I listened: I felt the presence of all the souls who passed through that place; I felt the compassion, the mercy of God, which a few holy souls were been able to bring even into that abyss. In that great silence, I prayed for all the victims of violence and war: and there, in that place, I realized more than ever how precious is memory; not only as a record of past events, but as a warning, and a responsibility for today and tomorrow, that the seed of hatred and violence not be allowed to take root in the furrows of history.”
Click below to hear our report
Departing from his prepared text, Pope Francis went on to recall the countless people – men and women, young and old – who still today suffer as a result of war. “Looking upon that cruelty, in that concentration camp,” he said, “I thought immediately of the cruelties of today, which are similar: not as concentrated as in that place, but everywhere in the world; this world that is sick with cruelty, pain, war, hatred, sadness; and this is why I always ask you for the prayer: that the Lord give us peace.”
Pope Francis’ visit to Poland also coincided with the twenty-fifth anniversary of the historic visit of Pope Saint John Paul II following the fall of the Iron Curtain.
“Poland, Europe and the world have changed greatly since then, but the young continue to be a prophetic sign of hope for the future.” Describing the scene of hundreds of thousands of young people from every corner of the globe waving the flags of their respective countries, Pope Francis said that the young people formed a mosaic of fraternity and a joyful response to the challenge of the Gospel. “Poland, with its rich cultural and spiritual heritage,” he continued, “today reminds us that Europe has no future apart from its founding values, centred on the Christian vision of man and including the message of mercy expressed so eloquently in the last century by Saints John Paul and Faustina Kowalska.”
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis on Wednesday asked for prayers for his upcoming trip to Assisi.
The Holy Father will travel to the Umbrian town on Thursday, to mark the eight centenary of the “Pardon of Assisi.” This is an indulgence granted to those who on 2 August visit the “Porziuncola,” the small church located within the Papal Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli (“St. Mary of the Angels”) which is where is where St. Francis of Assisi began the Franciscan Order.
The “Pardon of Assisi” was established by Pope Honorius III at the request of St. Francis in 1216.
It will be a very simple pilgrimage, but very significant in this Holy Year of Mercy,” – Pope Francis said – “I ask everyone to accompany me with prayer, invoking the light and the strength of the Holy Spirit and the heavenly intercession of Saint Francis.”
Pope Francis visited Assisi in 2013, a few months after his election to the See of Peter.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis on Wednesday invoked St. John Vianney – the famous “Curé d’Ars” – during his final blessing at the weekly general audience. The feast day of Saint John Vianney is celebrated on 4 August.
“A special greeting to the young people; the sick and infirm; and newlyweds,” – Pope Francis said – “Tomorrow we celebrate the memorial of St. John Vianney, patron of priests, and especially parish priests.”
He then asked for the saint’s intercession for their special intentions.
“May his great humility be an example to you, dear young people, to live life as a gift of God; may his trusting abandonment to Christ the Saviour sustain you, dear people suffering illness, in the hour of suffering; and may his Christian witness give courage to you, dear newlyweds, to profess your faith without shame,” the Holy Father said.
St. John Vianney was born in France in 1786. He served as a parish priest in the small town of Ars. His reputation for holiness drew thousands of people to listen to his sermons, and he would often spend over 12 hours a day listening to confessions.
He died on 4 August 1859. He was beatified in 1905, and canonized twenty years later.
(from Vatican Radio)…