(Vatican Radio) “Where the elderly are not honoured, there is no future for the young”. This was the powerful message delivered by Pope Francis during his catechesis on Wednesday, devoted to the elderly.
Speaking to the crowds gathered in St Peter’s Square for the weekly General Audience the Pope continued in his series of teachings on the family, focusing this time on the role of grandparents.
Listen to the report by Linda Bordoni:
Reflecting on the fact that life expectancy has increased in modern societies, Francis denounced a widespread lack of respect and consideration for the elderly and their dignity.
Recalling the words of Benedict XVI during a visit to an old age home when he said: “The quality of a society, I mean of a civilization, is also judged by how it treats elderly people and by the place it gives them in community life”, Pope Francis reiterated: “It is true, attention for the elderly is what makes the difference within a civilization”.
Nowadays, he said, people tend to live longer, but often our societies not only fail to make room for the elderly, but even consider them a burden.
And recounting an anecdote dating back to when he was Archbishop of Buenos Aires, Pope Francis told of how when visiting an old age home, he stopped to chat to one of the guests and asked her how her children were doing: “Well” answered the old woman. “Do they come to visit you?” he said. “Oh yes, always” she replied. “And when was the last time they came?” he continued. “At Christmas” she said. “It was August… Eight months without a visit from her children – this Pope Francis said is a mortal sin.”
“It’s is a mortal sin to discard our elderly”. The Pope insisted: “The elderly are not aliens, we are them, in a short or in a long while; we are inevitably them, even although we choose not to think about it”.
“If we do not learn to look after and to respect our elderly, we will be treated in the same way” he warned.
“A society where the elderly are discarded carries within it the virus of death” he said.
And calling the issue a major challenge for Western societies which are marked on the one hand by aging populations and on the other by a cult of youth efficiency and profit which tends to discard everything not considered productive or useful, Pope Francis said that because of the vulnerability and special needs of the elderly, especially of those who are ill or alone, they call for particular attention and care.
But rather than a burden – he said – they are, as the Bible tells us, a storehouse of wisdom.
The Church, Francis pointed out, has always accompanied the elderly with gratitude and affection, making them feel accepted and part of the community.
The Church, Pope Francis concluded, cannot accept degenerations such as the ones that see elderly people abandoned and marginalized: “where the elderly are not honoured there is no future for the young”.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) In the Paul VI Audience Hall before his General Audience on Wednesday, Pope Francis met with the Bishop Friends of the Focolare Movement.
Founded in Italy in 1943 by Chiara Lubich, the Focolare, also known as the Work of Mary, is an ecclesial movement that promotes the ideals of unity and universal brotherhood. Since 1977, a number of Bishops who desired to live out the spirituality of communion promoted by Focolare, have gathered together as the Bishop Friends of the Movement. The Bishop Friends hold regular meetings at international and regional levels.
Listen to Christopher Wells’ report:
In his address to the Bishops, Pope Francis called to mind the theme of their current meeting: “The Eucharist, Mystery of Communion.” He said, “the charism of unity proper to the Work of Mary is strongly anchored in the Eucharist, which gives it its Christian and ecclesial character.” It is the work of the Bishop to gather the community “around the Eucharist, around the double table of the Word and of the Bread of Life.” This, the Pope said, “is our service, and it is a fundamental one.”
Pope Francis said, “the Bishop is the principle of unity in the Church, but this does not take place without the Eucharist: the Bishop does not gather the people around his own person or his own ideas, but around Christ present in His Word and in the Sacrament of His Body and Blood.” When the Bishop is conformed to Christ, “nourished with faith in Christ the living Bread,” he is “is urged on by his love to give his life for the brothers and sisters, to go out, to go to meet those who are marginalized and despised.”
The Holy Father had special words of greeting for those Bishops present who had come from “the blood-soaked lands” of Iraq, Syria, and Ukraine. “In the suffering you have lived with your people,” he said, “you experience the strength that comes from the Eucharistic Jesus, the strength of going forward united in faith and hope.” He assured the Bishops the Church is united to them in the daily celebration of the Mass.
Concluding his address, Pope Francis encouraged the Bishops to carry on their “commitment in favour of the ecumenical journey and inter-religious dialogue” and thanked them for the contributions they make “to a greater communion between the various ecclesial movements.”
Below please find the full text of the Pope’s address to the Bishop Friends of the Focolare Movement:
Dear brothers,
I welcome you, and I thank Cardinal Kovithavanij for his introduction. And I thank the President and Co-President of the Focolare Movement for their presence.
You have brought together in Rome the friendship with this Movement and an interest in the “spirituality of communion.” In particular, in these days your reflection has centred on the theme of “The Eucharist, Mystery of Communion.”
In effect, the charism of unity proper to the Work of Mary is strongly anchored in the Eucharist, which gives it its Christian and ecclesial character. Without the Eucharist, unity would lose its divine pole of attraction, and would be reduced to simply human, psychological, sociological feeling and dynamic. Instead, the Eucharist guarantees that at the centre there is Christ, and there is His Spirit, the Holy Spirit, to move our steps and our initiatives of encounter and of communion.
The Apostle Paul writes: “Because the loaf of bread is one, we, though many, are one body, for we all partake of the one loaf” (1 Cor 10:17). As Bishops, we gather the communities around the Eucharist, the double table of the Word and of the Bread of Life. This is our service, and it is fundamental. The Bishop is the principle of unity in the Church, but this does not take place without the Eucharist: the Bishop does not gather the people around his own person or his own ideas, but around Christ present in His Word and in the Sacrament of His Body and Blood. And in the school of Jesus, the Good Shepherd made Himself the Lamb sacrificed and risen, the Bishop gathers the sheep entrusted to him with the offering of his life, himself taking on a form of Eucharistic existence. And so the Bishop, conformed to Christ, becomes a living Gospel, becomes Bread broken for the life of many with his preaching and his witness. He who is nourished with faith in Christ the living Bread is urged on by his love to give his life for the brothers and sisters, to go out, to go to meet those who are marginalized and despised.
In a particular way I thank you, Brothers, who come from the blood-soaked lands of Syria and of Iraq, and also of Ukraine. In the suffering you have lived with your people, you experience the strength that comes from the Eucharistic Jesus, the strength of going forward united in faith and hope.
In the daily celebration of the Mass we are united to you, we pray for you offering the Sacrifice of Christ; and from it the many initiatives of solidarity in favour of your Churches gain their strength and significance.
Dear Brothers, I encourage you to carry on your commitment in favour of the ecumenical journey and inter-religious dialogue. And I thank you for the contribution you make to a greater communion between the various ecclesial movements.
May the Lord bless you and the Madonna protect you. Let us pray for one another. I thank you for your prayers.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) The official programme for Pope Francis’ visit to Pompeii and Naples was published Tuesday by the Vatican Press Office.
The one-day visit scheduled for Saturday, 21 March will begin at 7am in the Vatican where the Pope will board a helicopter that will take him to the Shrine of Pompeii where he will gather in prayer.
Listen to Christopher Wells’ report:
At 9am Pope Francis is due to arrive in Scampia, an impoverished area close to Naples where he will meet with the community in the John Paul II Square.
Midmorning sees the Pope celebrating Mass in Naples’ central Piazza del Plebiscito.
A special moment will be dedicated to prison inmates when the Pope travels to the “Giuseppe Salvia” Detention Centre in Poggioreale where he will also share lunch with some of the detainees.
In the early afternoon he is scheduled to venerate the relics of Saint Gennaro and meet with the clergy, the religious and the deacons in the city’s main Cathedral.
Before departing for the Vatican at approximately 6pm, Pope Francis will visit some sick people in the Basilica del Gesù and will meet a group of young people at a venue on the Caracciolo sea-front.
He will travel back to the Vatican by helicopter.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) A press conference was held in the Holy See Press Office Monday morning to present the Pan-Amazon Ecclesial Network (REPAM), established in 2014 in Brasilia, Brazil, during a meeting of bishops whose territories include Amazon regions, priests, missionaries of congregations who work in the Amazon jungle, national representatives of Caritas and laypeople belonging to various Church bodies.
“We are not talking simply about ecological issues – maintaining the trees which are threatened by the logging that goes on there – it is also about the biodiversity which is also being threatened by the fact when farms are created they basically go monocultural for intensity of production,” said Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson, President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace.
Listen to the interview with Cardinal Peter Turkson:
“The indigenous population is also threatened by the fact that their natural habitat is taken away,” he told Vatican Radio.
“When they talk about the Amazonian threat, it is not just that the forests are disappearing – and that the source of water and the atmosphere – but the different lifeforms are all under threat,” Cardinal Turkson said.
The form in which REPAM is structured is meant to serve as a model for other local churches in other countries facing similar challenges.
“This is an initiative that has been brought over here to put emphasis on the ecclesiality of the initiative,” said Cardinal Turkson.
(from Vatican Radio)…
(Vatican Radio) God “generously forgives” those who “learn to do good”, but what he doesn’t forgive is “hypocrisy and fake saints”, said Pope Francis at Mass Tuesday morning in Casa Santa Marta chapel.
Pope Francis said that there has never been any doubts that God prefers “sanctified sinners” – people who, despite their past sins, learn how to do a greater good — to “fake saints” – people who are more concerned with appearing saintly than doing good.
The Pope was reflecting on the first reading from Isaiah, which he described as an “invitation and an imperative” that comes directly from God: “Cease to do evil, learn to do good” defending orphans and widows, namely “those who no one remembers”. Pope Francis said this category includes the “abandoned elderly”, “children who do not go to school”, and those “who do not know how to make the sign of the Cross”. Essentially it is an invitation to conversion:
“But how can I convert? ‘By learning to do right!’. Conversion. You cannot remove the filth of the heart as you would remove a stain: we go to the dry cleaner and leave cleansed … This filth is removed by ‘doing’: taking a different path, a different path from that of evil. ‘Learn to do right!’, That is, the path of doing good. And how do I do good? It’s simple! ‘Seek justice, encourage the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow’. Remember that in Israel the poorest and most needy were orphans and widows: do justice to them, go there to the wounds of humanity, where there is so much pain … And by doing so, by doing good, you will cleanse your heart “.
Pope Francis continued that a cleansed heart is promised God’s forgiveness. God does not keep account of the sins of those who concretely love their neighbors. “If you do this, if you take this path to which I invite you – the Lord tells us – ‘though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow’. It is an exaggeration, the Lord exaggerates: but it is the truth! The Lord gives us the gift of His forgiveness. The Lord forgives generously. ‘I forgive you this much, then we’ll see about the rest….’ No, no! The Lord always forgives everything! Everything! But if you want to be forgiven, you must set out on the path of doing good. This is the gift! ‘.
Pope Francis went on to say the Gospel of the day, instead, presents the hypocrisy of the Pharisees and Scribes. He was reflecting on people “who say all the right things, but do the exact opposite.”
“We are all clever and always find a path that is not right, to seem more virtuous than we are: it is the path of hypocrisy”. “They pretend to convert, but their heart is a lie: they are liars! It ‘a lie … Their heart does not belong to the Lord; their heart belongs to the father of all lies, Satan. And this is fake holiness. Jesus preferred sinners a thousand times to these. Why? Because sinners told the truth about themselves. ‘Get away from me, Lord, I am a sinner!’: Peter once said. One of those [the hypocrites] never says that! ‘Thank you Lord, that I am not a sinner, that I am righteous … In the second week of Lent we have these three words to think about, to ponder: the invitation to conversion; the gift that the Lord will give us, which is great forgiveness, a great forgiveness; and the trap — that is, pretending to convert, while choosing the path of hypocrisy”.
(from Vatican Radio)…