(Vatican Radio) The story of the Good Samaritan and its lesson of “love thy neighbour” were at the heart of Pope Francis’ catechesis during the General Audience on Wednesday 27 April.
Below, we publish the Holy Father’s message to the English speaking pilgrims present in Saint Peter’s Square:
Dear Brothers and Sisters: In our catechesis for this Holy Year of Mercy, we now turn to the parable of the Good Samaritan. Jesus had taught the great commandment of love for God and neighbour. In reply to the question: “Who is my neighbour?”, he recounts the story of the priest and the levite who pass by a man in need at the side of the road. Their religiosity is ultimately inauthentic, for it does not find expression in service to others. Love, the Lord tells us, is never abstract or distant; it “sees” and it responds. The compassion shown by the Samaritan is an image of the infinite mercy of God, who always sees our needs and draws near to us in love. The command to love God and neighbour, then, is supremely practical; it entails caring for others even to the point of personal sacrifice. By the end of the parable, we see that the “neighbour” is not so much the man in need, but rather the one who responded to that need with compassion. Jesus tells all of us to be neighbours in this sense: “Go and do likewise”. He himself is the model of the Good Samaritan; by imitating his love and compassion, we show ourselves truly to be his followers.
I greet the English-speaking visitors taking part in today’s Audience, particularly the pilgrims from England, Sweden, Slovakia, China, Indonesia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, the Philippines, Canada and the United States of America. In the joy of the Risen Lord, I invoke upon you and your families the loving mercy of God our Father. May the Lord bless you all!
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis said Tuesday that the clergy should serve lay people and not make use of them and spoke out against clericalism, calling it one of the greatest distortions affecting the Church in Latin America. His comments came in a wide-ranging letter reflecting on the role of the laity that was addressed to Cardinal Marc Ouellet, President of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America. The Pope’s letter was a follow-up to the commission’s recent Plenary Assembly whose theme was “the indispensable role of the lay faithful in the public life of Latin American countries.” In his letter, Pope Francis explained that he wished to follow-up the discussions and reflections that emerged during the Plenary Assembly in order to prevent them “from not bearing fruit.”
He urged the clergy to look closely at the people and lives of the lay faithful and avoid falling into the trap of adopting certain slogans on their behalf that seem well-meaning but in practice don’t succeed in supporting the lives of our communities. Pointing to the example of a famous phrase “it’s time for the laity,” he noted that in this particular case, that clock has ground to a halt.
We must remember, he said, that as clergy we all began our lives as lay people and that “we’d do well to recall that the Church is not an elite of priests, of consecrated people, of bishops but all of us make up the faithful and Holy People of God.”
Turning to the issue of clericalism, the Pope said he considered it the outcome of “a mistaken way of living out the ecclesiology proposed by the Second Vatican Council” and described clericalism as “one of the greatest distortions affecting the Church in Latin America.” He said clericalism has many negative impacts such as wiping out the personality of Christians and causing a belittling of the grace of our baptism that the Holy Spirit has placed in the hearts of lay people. Clericalism, he reminded, “forgets that the visibility and the sacramentality of the Church belong to all the people of God and not just to an illuminated and elected few.”
On the positive side, Pope Francis noted that Latin America is characterized by many examples of popular ministry and piety, saying it is one of the few spaces where the laity (including their pastors) and the Holy Spirit have been able to come together without clericalism which he said “seeks to control and put a brake on this anointment by God of the faithful.” He warned that this popular ministry “has its limits” and can sometimes lead to distortions of religion but said if it is “steered properly” it can generate many excellent human values such as generosity, devotion, sacrifice and openness to others.
Pope Francis spoke of the importance of giving encouragement and support to the efforts of the lay faithful who work in the public sphere but at the same time stressed “it is not the job of the pastor to tell the lay people what they must do and say” in those situations, adding “they know more and better than us.” “It’s illogical and even impossible,” he continued, “for us as pastors to believe that we have the monopoly on solutions for the numerous challenges thrown up by contemporary life.”
In conclusion, the Pope reiterated that the lay faithful are the protagonists of the Church and the world and stressed that “we are called to serve them, not to make use of them.”
Listen to this report by Susy Hodges:
(from Vatican Radio)…
“Your happiness has no price. It cannot be bought: it is not an ‘app’ that
you can download on your phones”. This was Pope Francis’ admonition to the
thousands of young people gathered in St Peter’s Square on Sunday morning, 24
April, to celebrate their Jubilee Mass, which was the culmination of the three
Jubilee days attended in Rome by adolescents from around the world. With a simple
and direct homily, with a wealth of ideas and references to the everyday
experiences of the young, Francis spoke again on the consignment of Christian
love: not that “pie in the sky” love or that found in soap operas, he
explained, but the “genuine love” that Jesus teaches about. This love, the
Pontiff underscored, “is not an easy path. It is demanding and it requires
effort”, but in the end “it makes us happy”. Above
all, from the Pope’s standpoint, love means giving: “not only something
material, but also something of one’s self: one’s own time, one’s friendship,
one’s own abilities”. It is a matter of being able to “love without being
possessive”, letting others be free and witnessing first hand the freedom of
“being able to choose the good”. It is a commitment to make “courageous and
noble choices”, not accepting “mediocrity” and to foster “responsibility” After
the Mass, at the Regina Caeli the Pope renewed the appeal for the bishops,
priests and religious, both Christian and Orthodox, who are sequestered in
Syria. Later
in the afternoon, the Pope went to Villa Borghese to meet with leaders of the
Mariapolis in Rome organized by the Focolare Movement, where he spoke about the
need to have mercy in relationships with others. He spoke of forgiveness in a
video message sent on Saturday evening to the young people gathered in Rome’s
Olympic Stadium for an evening of celebration
and testimony. To sixteen of them in that morning, the Pope had
administered the Sacrament of Confession in St Peter’s Square….
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has sent a letter to prisoners detained in a prison in the Italian city of Velletri, a short distance from Rome.
Prisoners at the facility had written to the Holy Father earlier this year, entrusting their letter to Bishop Marcello Semeraro, the Bishop of Albano, during a pastoral visit to the facility. In his response, Pope Francis thanked the detainees for thinking of him, and assured them that they, and others in similar situations, were often in his thoughts as well. He noted that during his Apostolic Voyages, he always tries to make a visit to local prisons.
The Pope noted that during the Holy Year of Mercy, there will also be a jubilee for prisoners, and he assured them that on that day he would be “in communion” with all prisoners “spiritually and in reciprocal prayer.”
Pope Francis also expressed his sympathy, noting that prisoners “are living an experience in which time seems both to be stopped, and to never end.” But, he said, “the true measure of time is not that of the clock”; rather, “the true measure of time is called hope.” He expressed his desire that all those incarcerated might “always keep lit the light of the hope of faith to illuminate” their lives.
“Always be certain that God loves you personally,” the Pope wrote to the prisoners. He encouraged them to never allow themselves to be closed in by their past, but rather to transform the past “into a journey of growth, of faith and charity.” He called on them to “give God the possibility” of making them “to shine” through their experience, recalling that many saints throughout history “have achieved sanctity” in harsh and difficult situations. “With Christ,” he said, “all this is possible.”
(from Vatican Radio)…
“Killed because he was a priest”. This was the real reason for the
martyrdom of Fr. Valentín Palencia Marquina (1871-1937), who was assassinated
along with four young lay people: Donato Rodríguez García, Germán García
García, Zacarías Cuesta Campo, and Emilio Huidobro Corrales. Their only fault
was wanting to defend the faith and share the fate of their father, teacher and
friend. Cardinal Angelo Amato, Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of
Saints, recalled the event of the five martyrs on the occasion of their
beatification. The Cardinal, as Pope Francis’ representative, presided at the
Rite on Saturday morning, 23 April, in the Cathedral of Burgos, Spain. “Cognizant of the
imminent danger, the martyrs, before the massacre”, the Cardinal said, “prayed much, in order to prepare themselves
for death with a meek and forgiving attitude”. They made “no act of rebellion”.
He then shared details of the final moments of Fr Valentín’s life: he managed
to preserve a consecrated host in his pocket, as the viaticum for his meeting
with the Lord….