Saturday, March 10, 2018

Speaking of mercy

At 12:10pm today (6:10am EST), in the Consistory Hall at the Vatican Apostolic Palace, the Holy Father, Pope Francis received in audience the members of the Fontaine de la Miséricorde Foundation from Switzerland.


Greetings of His Holiness, Pope Francis
offered to members of the
Fontaine de la Miséricorde Foundation

Dear friends,

I am pleased to meet with you on the occasion of your pilgrimage to Rome.  I offer my cordial greetings to the members of the Fontaine de la Miséricorde as well as to all those who you welcome and accompany in your Schools of prayer and fraternal formation.

With you, I give thanks to the Lord, who has permitted you to experience his mercy and who has led you to seek and to propose ways for his mercy to remain rooted in your hearts and therefore help you to consider your daily lives with serenity (cf Apostolic Letter, Misericordia et misera, 3).  Therefore, I invite you to persevere in the regular practice of prayer.  You know: it is there, in the heart of hearts with the Lord, listening to his Word, that he gives himself to us so that we can be reborn each day in the living waters of his mercy, flowing from his open heart.  May you also, through your sacramental life, become witnesses of the mercy of God who is a call for all people to be reborn to the beauty and the happiness of being loved by Him.  Finally, I encourage you, through your fraternal life  and with the aid of the Holy Spirit, to allow a culture of mercy to grow, based on the rediscovery of the encounter with others: a culture in which no one looks to another with indifference or turns away when he sees his brothers in pain (MM, 20).

With this hope, I confide you to the Lord and to the intercession of the Virgin Mary; and, asking you to pray for me, I give you my Apostolic blessing, which I also extend to all the members of the Fontaine de la Miséricorde.

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