(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis, in an audience with Vatican security personnel Thursday, thanked officers and agents for their service, saying the new year brings many expectations and hopes. Speaking to officers and agents of the Inspectorate of Public Security, State Police and chaplains for the security services, Pope Francis observed the new year also brings “darkness and dangers that worry humanity.” The Pope also said he wished in particular, to recall in prayer one of their Italian colleagues who recently passed away and offered a fond embrace to the man’s wife and son, also present at the audience.
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As Christians, the Pope said, “we are called not to lose heart and not to be discouraged.”
He reminded security officials of the human and Christian values they represent in “guarding and monitoring places that have great importance for the faith and the life of millions of pilgrims.” The Pope recalled the many people who come to visit the “heart of Christian Rome” and the times they turn to security personnel for assistance. “May each of them feel helped and guarded by your presence and your thoughtfulness,” he said, adding that the Lord holds us all accountable for the good and bad we have done towards others while carrying out our duties.
Below, please find Vatican Radio’s unofficial translation of the original text in Italian:
Mr. Chief of Police,
Mr. Prefect,
Mr Commissioner,
Dear Officers and Agents,
I am pleased to welcome you on the occasion of the exchange of good wishes for the new year, which marks the 70th anniversary of your activity. This traditional meeting gives me the opportunity to extend a personal greeting to you and to express my grateful appreciation for the work you carry out daily with professionalism and dedication.
My greeting and my wishes go first to Dr. Maria Rosaria Maiorino, whom I thank for the kind words addressed to me on behalf of all. I cordially greet the members of the Inspectorate of Public Security at the Vatican, as well as other managers and officials of the State Police and Chaplains led by the National Coordinator. I assure a special remembrance in prayer for your colleague Alessandro, who recently passed away, fondly embracing his wife and son who are here.
We have just started a new year, and many are our expectations and our hopes. On the horizon we also see darkness and dangers that worry humanity. As Christians we are called not to lose heart and not to be discouraged. Our hope rests on an unshakable rock: the love of God, revealed and given to us in Christ Jesus, our Lord. We remember the comforting words of the apostle Paul: “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword? … But in all these things we are more than conquerors thanks to Him who loved us “(Rom 8,35.37).
Dear officers and agents, in the light of this firm hope, your work takes on a different meaning, which involves human and Christian values. For you, in fact, have the task of guarding and monitoring places that have great importance for the faith and the life of millions of pilgrims. Many people who come to visit the heart of Christian Rome often turn [to you for assistance]. May each of them feel helped and guarded by your presence and your thoughtfulness. Yes, dear brothers and sisters, we are all called to be stewards of our neighbor. The Lord will call us to account for the responsibilities entrusted to us, for the good or bad that we have done towards our neighbor.
We entreat the maternal protection of the Virgin Mother at the beginning of this new year. We entrust to her every concern and hope, so that in all circumstances of life we can love, rejoice and live in the faith of the Son of God who became man for us.
I ask you to please pray for me and offer you my heartfelt blessing.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis, in an audience with Vatican security personnel Friday, thanked officers and agents for their service, saying the new year brings many expectations and hopes. Speaking to officers and agents of the Inspectorate of Public Security, State Police and chaplains for the security services, Pope Francis observed the new year also brings…
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(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis told an ecumenical delegation from Finland Thursday that Catholics and Lutherans can do much together “to bear witness to God’s mercy.” The delegation’s visit to Rome coincides with the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity and the Feast of St. Henry, the patron saint of Finland. In his discourse to the…
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(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis told an ecumenical delegation from Finland Thursday that Catholics and Lutherans can do much together “to bear witness to God’s mercy.” The delegation’s visit to Rome coincides with the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity and the Feast of St. Henry, the patron saint of Finland.
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In his discourse to the Finnish delegates, Pope Francis applauded the progress achieved in ecumenical dialogue between the two Churches over the last thirty years and said, “a shared Christian witness is very much needed in the face of the mistrust, insecurity, persecution, pain and suffering experienced so widely in today’s world.”
Below, please find the text of Pope Francis’ discourse to the ecumenical delegation from Finland:
Dear Bishop Vikström,
Dear Bishop Sippo,
Dear Friends,
It is with joy that I welcome you, on the occasion of your annual ecumenical pilgrimage to Rome to celebrate the feast of Saint Henrik, the patron of your country. This annual event has proven to be a truly spiritual and ecumenical meeting between Catholics and Lutherans, a tradition dating back thirty years.
Saint Pope John Paul II addressed the members of the first Finnish ecumenical delegation which had come to Rome thirty years ago in these words: “The fact that you come here together is itself a witness to the importance of efforts for unity. The fact that you pray together is a witness to our belief that only through the grace of God can that unity be achieved. The fact that you recite the Creed together is a witness to the one common faith of the whole of Christianity”. At that time, the first important steps had already been taken on a common ecumenical journey towards full, visible unity of the Christians. In these intervening years much has been done and, I am certain, will continue to be done in Finland to make “the partial communion existing between Christians grow toward full communion in truth and charity” (John Paul II, Ut Unum Sint , 14).
Your visit comes within the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. This year our reflection is based on Christ’s words to the Samaritan woman at the well: «Give me to drink» ( Jn 4:1-42). We are reminded that the source of all grace is the Lord himself, and that his gifts transform those who receive them, making them witnesses to the true life that is in him alone (cf. Jn 4:39). As the Gospel tells us, many Samaritans believed in Jesus because of the woman’s testimony. As you, Bishop Vikstrom, have said, there is so much that Catholics and Lutherans can do together to bear witness to God’s mercy in our societies. A shared Christian witness is very much needed in the face of the mistrust, insecurity, persecution, pain and suffering experienced so widely in today’s world.
This common witness can be sustained and encouraged by progress in theological dialogue between the Churches. The Joint Declaration on the Doctrine on Justification, which was solemnly signed some fifteen years ago between the Lutheran World Federation and the Catholic Church, can produce further fruits of reconciliation and cooperation between us. The Nordic Lutheran–Catholic dialogue in Finland and Sweden, under the related theme Justification in the Life of the Church , has been reflecting on important questions deriving from the Joint Declaration. Let us hope that further convergence will emerge from that dialogue on the concept of the Church, the sign and instrument of the salvation brought to us in Jesus Christ.
It is my prayer that your visit to Rome will contribute to strengthening further the ecumenical relations between Lutherans and Catholics in Finland, which have been so positive for many years. May the Lord send upon us the Spirit of truth, to guide us towards ever greater love and unity.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Cardinal Fernando Filoni, the Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, is on a pastoral visit this week to Vietnam. On Tuesday, Cardinal Filoni, who was accompanied by the Archbishop of Hanoi Cardinal Nguyen Van Nhon, met with the Secretary of the Hanoi Party Committee Pham Quang Nghi, who is also a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam.
During the encounter, Nghi said the Party and State of Vietnam and municipal authorities respect freedom of religion and belief and acknowledge the tradition of solidarity of the nation and among religions.
He congratulated Archbishop Nguyen Van Nhon on his appointment as Cardinal by Pope Francis, saying it accurately reflects his contributions to the Vietnamese Catholic community, which he praised for their contributions to the development of the capital and the nation as a whole.
Cardinal Filoni told Vatican Radio the exchange was “very pleasant.”
“I [told Mr. Nghi] that dialogue is the fundamental element for mutual understanding, but that at the basis of dialogue is there has to be esteem,” Cardinal Filoni said.
“The esteem the Holy See has for the people of Vietnam also is transformed into love, so it is not only a purely formal esteem, but goes deeper and becomes affection, love,” he continued. “The Church has a profound affection, a deep love, for the people of Vietnam, especially its Christian community.”
Cardinal Filoni told Vatican Radio the Church in Vietnam as “very much alive,” which was carrying on the “missionary commitment of Pope Francis.”
During his trip, Cardinal Filoni has met with many of the civil authorities in the country. The day before his meeting with Nghi, he met with Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung.
The Cardinal told Vatican Radio he hopes these meetings will further relations between the Holy See and Vietnam.
“I found much openness, a great willingness to carry on the dialogue that has started, and that can progressively take steps forward,” he said.
(from Vatican Radio)…