Acknowledging that we are sinners and being
able to ask for forgiveness is the first step in a decisive response to the
question that Jesus asks each of us directly: “are you with me or against me?”.
Thus, during Mass at Santa Marta on Thursday, 3 March, the Pope invited us to
open ourselves unconditionally to God’s mercy. At
the beginning of the first reading, Francis noted, the prophet Jeremiah
(7:23-28), “reminds us of God’s pact with his people: ‘Listen to my voice; then
I will be your God and you shall be my people. Walk in all the ways that I
command you, so that you may prosper”. It is “a faithfulness pact”. Both
readings, he continued, “tell us another story: this pact failed and today the
Church makes us reflect on it; we can call it a history of failed
faithfulness”. In reality, “God always remains faithful, because he cannot deny
himself”. However the people amass infidelities, “one after another: they
become unfaithful, they are unfaithful!”. The
Book of Jeremiah recounts that the people do not hold true to the pact: ‘But
they obeyed not, nor did they pay heed’”. Scripture also tells us, Francis
explained, of the “many things that God did in order to attract the hearts of
his people: ‘From the day that your fathers left the land of Egypt even to this
day, I have sent you untiringly all my servants the prophets. Yet they have not
obeyed me nor paid heed; they have stiffened their necks and done worse than
their fathers’”. This passage of Jeremiah ends on a strong note: “Faithfulness
has disappeared”, it is “cut off from their lips”. The
“unfaithfulness of the People of God”, like our own unfaithfulness, “hardens
the heart: it closes the heart!”, and it keeps out “the voice of the Lord who,
as loving father, asks us to always open ourselves to his mercy and his love”.
In Psalm 95[94] “we prayed together: hear today the voice of the Lord: harden
not your hearts!”. It’s true, the Pontiff stated, “the Lord always speaks to us
this way”, and “with fatherly tenderness he tells us: return to me with all
your heart, for I am merciful and compassionate”. However,
“when your heart is hard you cannot understand this”, Francis explained. In
fact, “God’s mercy is understood only if you are able to open your heart, so it
can enter”. And this continues, it “goes on: the heart hardens, and we see the
same story” in the day’s passage from the Gospel of Luke (11:14-23). “There
were people, the doctors of the law, who had studied the Scriptures, who knew
theology, but were very, very closed-minded. The crowd was amazed:
astonishment! Because the crowd was following Jesus. Someone might say: ‘But
they followed him in order to be healed, this is why they were following him’”. The
reality, Francis pointed out, was that the people “trusted Jesus! Their hearts
were open: imperfect, sinful, but their hearts were open”. On the other hand,
“the theologians had a closed-minded attitude” and “were always looking for an
explanation so as not to understand Jesus’ message”. Thus, in this specific
case, as Luke writes, they said: “No, this man casts out demons in the name of
the prince of demons”. They were always seeking other pretexts, the Gospel
continues, “to put him to the test: they asked him for a sign from heaven”. The
underlying problem, the Pope remarked, was that they were “always closed”.
Therefore, “it was Jesus who had to justify what he did”. “This
is the story, the history of failed faithfulness”, Francis said, “the history
of closed hearts, of hearts that would not let God’s mercy enter, which had
forgotten the word ‘forgiveness’ — ‘Forgive me, Lord!’ — simply because they
did not feel they were sinners: they felt they were the judges of others”. And
this history goes on for centuries. “Jesus explains this failed faithfulness
with two clear words in order to end the discussion with these hypocrites:
“Whoever is not with me is against me”. In the language Jesus used, the Pope
said, it is clear: “either you are faithful, with your heart open to God who is
faithful to you, or you are against him: ‘Whoever is not with me is against
me’”. Someone may think that there is perhaps “a middle ground for
negotiations”, to escape the clarity of Jesus’ words, “either you are faithful
or you are opposed”. In essence, Francis replied, “there is a way out: confess,
sinner!”. Because “if you say, ‘I am a sinner’, your heart opens, God’s mercy
enters, and you begin to be faithful”. Before
continuing the celebration, the Pontiff advised that we ask “the Lord for the
grace of faithfulness”, knowing that “the first step” on the “path of
faithfulness is feeling we are sinners”. Indeed, “if you do not feel you are a
sinner, you have started off wrong”. Therefore, Francis concluded, “let us ask
for the grace that our hearts not harden, that they be open to God’s mercy”,
and ask for “the grace of faithfulness”. Let us also ask for the “grace to ask
forgiveness” when we find we are unfaithful….
Madrid – Next Sunday, 6 March, “Latin-American Day” with this year’s theme “Prophets of Marcy”, is promoted by the Missions Commission of the Spanish Catholic Bishops’ Conference and OCSHA . To mark the annual Day, representatives of local Churches of Latin America and Spain meet to discuss activities aimed at intensifying communion, collaboration and solidarity between these closely connected peoples and nations. It is also a day to remember all Spanish missionaries in Latin America. According to information issued for the occasion today 970 Spanish fidei donum priests are on missionary service in Latin America. Toledo is the Spanish diocese with the highest number of missionaries in Latin America, Fides learns. “Today, the report says, we express and renew our gratitude to the 31 priests from Toledo serving the Church in Latin American countries, those who are members of OCSHA, and all Spanish, sisters and brothers, priests and lay persons Fidei Donum missionaries for the evangelisation of those lands. Since 1959, on this day of special celebration we remember the numerous missionaries with prayers and church communion made explicit in cooperation among the local Churches ” the note concludes. Link correlati : Materiale per la celebrazione della Giornata:…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis says the Church has no need for “blood” money that derives from exploitation of people; what it needs is that the hearts of faithful be open to God’s mercy.
Speaking to the crowds gathered in St. Peter’s Square for the weekly General Audience, the Pope’s catechesis was inspired by the Holy Year of Mercy and he reflected on God’s fatherly love and forgiveness.
When God’s children err in their ways, the Pope said, God calls out to them lovingly and never disowns them.
“The most evil of men, the most evil of women, and the most evil of peoples are His children” he said.
The Lord never disowns us; he always calls us to be close to Him. This – the Pope said – is the love of our Father, the mercy of God.
“To have a Father like this gives us hope and trust” he said.
And commenting on the fact that “when a person is sick he turns to the doctor; when he feels he has sinned” Francis said: “he must turn to God – because if he turns to the witchdoctor he will not be healed”.
Pointing out that “we often choose to tread the wrong paths in search of a justification, justice, and peace” Pope Francis said that these are gifts that are bestowed upon us by the Lord if we choose the right path and turn to Him.
“I think of some benefactors of the Church, who come with an offer for the Church and their offer is the fruit of the blood of people who have been exploited, enslaved with work which was under-payed” he said.
“I will tell these people to please take back their cheques. The People of God don’t need their dirty money but hearts that are open to the mercy of God” he said.
Reflecting on how the prophet Isaiah presents God in the Scriptures, he said that this fatherly love of the Lord also involves correction, a summons to conversion and the renewal of the Covenant.
If he chastises his people, the Pope said, it is to move them to repentance and conversion, and in his mercy, he asks them to turn back to him with all their hearts and to receive a righteousness that is itself his gift.
“Though our sins be like scarlet, he will make them white as snow” he said.
And with a special thought and mention for the many refugees who are attempting to enter Europe and do not know where to go, Pope Francis invited the faithful to be open, during this year of grace, to our heavenly Father’s merciful invitation to come back to him and to experience this miracle of his love and forgiveness.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis celebrated Mass in the chapel of the Casa Santa Marta in the Vatican on Tuesday morning. In remarks to the faithful following the readings of the day, the Holy Father spoke on the season of Lent as a privileged time in which to prepare our hearts to receive God’s forgiveness and to forgive our neighbors in turn, forgetting the faults of others.
The Holy Father’s address focused on God’s infinite capacity for forgiveness as a perfection of his nature, which contrasts sharply with the inability of fallen human nature to make even the slightest concession to its own frailty.
Without memory
Taking as his starting point the Gospel account of Peter’s well-known question to Jesus regarding how many times we are to forgive a brother who has sinned against us – seventy times seven times (cf. Mt. 18:22) – and the account from the 1 st reading of the young Azaria, sentenced to death in a furnace for refusing to worship a golden idol, who, from the flames of the fiery furnace invokes God’s mercy for the people at the same time as he implores forgiveness for himself (cf. Dn. 3:25,33-43), the Holy Father offered the young Azaria’s prayer as an especially apt illustration of the way we ought to trust in the goodness and mercy of the Lord:
“When God forgives, his forgiveness is so great that it is as though God forgets. Quite the opposite of what we do, as we chatter: ‘But so-and-so did such-and-such,’ and we have the complete histories of many people, don’t we? From antiquity through their Middles Ages, their modernity, and even down to their present – and we do not forget. Why? Because we do not have a merciful heart. ‘Do with us with us according to your clemency,’ says this young Azaria ‘according to Thy great mercy Save us.’ It is an appeal to the mercy of God, that He might give us forgiveness and salvation and forget our sins.”
The equation of forgiveness
In the Gospel passage, explaining to Peter that we must always forgive, Jesus tells the parable of the two debtors, the first who gets a pardon from his master, while owing him a huge fortune, and who even shortly afterward was himself unable to be as merciful with another, who owed him only a small sum:
“In the Our Father we pray: ‘Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.’ It is an equation: the two sides go together. If you are not able to forgive, how will God forgive you? He wants to forgive you, but He will not if you have closed hearts, where mercy cannot enter. ‘But, Father, I forgive, but I cannot forget the bad turn that so-and-so did me …’. Well, ask the Lord to help you to forget. That, however, is another matter. We can forgive, but we cannot always forget. Sometimes we say, ‘I forgive you,’ when we mean, ‘you’ll pay me later’. This, never: forgive as God forgives – to the utmost.”
Mercy which “forgets”
Pope Francis went on to stress that mercy, compassion, forgiveness, repeated the Pope, are most Godly, and recalled that heartfelt pardon given and received is always an act of Divine mercy:
“May Lent prepare our hearts to receive God’s forgiveness – but let us receive it and then do the same with others: forgive heartily. Perhaps you never even greet me in the street, but in my heart I have forgiven you. In this way, we get closer to this thing so great, so Godly, which is mercy. Forgiving, we open our hearts so that God’s mercy might come and forgive us, for, we all have need of pardon, need to ask forgiveness. Let us forgive, and we shall be forgiven. Let us have mercy on others, and we shall feel that mercy of God, who, when He forgives, [also] ‘forgets.’”
(from Vatican Radio)…
God’s salvation comes not from great
things, not from power or money, no from clerical or political networks, but
from little and simple things that sometimes even arise from disdain. Francis
proposed this meditation during Mass at Santa Marta on Monday morning, 29
February. “The
Church prepares us for Easter and today makes us reflect on salvation: what do
we think salvation is like”, Francis began, “the salvation that we all want?”.
The story of “Naaman’s disease”, narrated in the Second Book of Kings (5:1-15),
presents “the fact of death: and afterwards?”. Indeed, “when there is sickness,
it always leads us back to that thought: salvation”. But, the Pontiff asked,
“how does salvation come about? What is the path to salvation? What is God’s
revelation to us Christians with regard to salvation?”. In
the Pope’s view, “the key word to understanding the Church’s message today is
disdain”. When “Naaman, arriving at
Elisha’s house, asked to be cured, Elisha sent a boy to tell him to wash in the
Jordan seven times. A simple thing”. Perhaps for this reason “Naaman
disdained”, exclaiming: “I have made such a journey, with so many gifts…”.
Instead everything was resolved by simply bathing in the river. Moreover,
Naaman continued, “our rivers are more beautiful than this one”. Francis
then pointed out, in reference to the Gospel passage taken from Luke (4:24-30),
that “the inhabitants of Nazareth” similarly “disdained after hearing the
reading of the prophet Isaiah, which Jesus did that Sabbath in the synagogue”,
when he said “‘today this has happened’, speaking of the liberation, of how the
people would be freed”. The people commented: “What do you think about this
man? He is one of us, we saw him grow up from boyhood, he never studied”. And
the people “disdained” and even “wanted to kill him”. Again,
the Pope continued, “later on Jesus felt this disdain on the part of the
leaders, the doctors of the law who sought salvation in moral casuistry — ‘this
can be done to this point, to that point…’ — and thus I don’t know how many
commandments they had, and the poor people…”. This is why the people did not
trust them. The same thing happened with “the Sadducees, who sought salvation
in compromises with the powerful men of the world, with the emperor: some with
clerical networks, others with political networks sought salvation in this
way”. But “the people had an instinct and didn’t believe” in them. Instead,
“they believed in Jesus because he spoke with authority”. And
so, the Pope asked, “why this disdain?”. It is because, he said, “in our
imagination salvation must come from something great, from something majestic:
only the powerful can save us, those who have strength, who have money, who
have power, these people can save us”. Instead, “God’s plan is different”.
Thus, “they feel disdain because they cannot understand that salvation comes
only from little things, from the simplicity of the things of God”. And “when
Jesus proposes the way of salvation, he never speaks of great things”, but only
“little things”. From
this perspective Francis suggested a re-reading of the Gospel Beatitudes — “you
will be saved if you do this” — and of Matthew, chapter 25. They are “the two
pillars of the Gospel: ‘Come, come with me because you have done this”. It
involves “simple things: you did not seek salvation or hope in power, in
networks, in negotiations, no; you simply did this”. Yet actually, this gives
rise to much disdain. The
Pope then proposed, “in preparation for Easter”, as he too intends to do,
“reading the Beatitudes and reading Matthew 25, and thinking and seeing if
something about this causes me disdain, takes peace away from me”. Because
“disdain is a luxury that only the vain, the proud allow themselves”. Here,
“at the end of the Beatitudes”, Francis explained, Jesus says something
powerful: “Blessed is he who is not shocked by me”, who “does not disdain this, who does not feel
disdain”. Reflecting on the reasons for these words, the Pope repeated that “it
will do us good to take a little time — today, tomorrow — and read the
Beatitudes, read Matthew and pay attention to what is happening in our heart:
whether there is something that causes disdain”. And “ask the Lord for the
grace to understand that the only way to salvation is the folly of the cross,
that is, the annihilation of the Son of God, of his becoming small”. In today’s
liturgy, Pope Francis concluded, “the little thing” is “represented by bathing
in the Jordan and by the little village of Nazareth”….