At noon today, the Holy Father appeared at the window of his study in the Vatican Apostolic Palace, to recite the Angelus with the faithful and the pilgrims who had gathered in Saint Peter’s Square.
Greetings
of His Holiness, Pope Francis
before the recitation of the Angelus
Dear brothers and sisters, good morning!
This Sunday’s gospel (Lk 12:32-48) speaks of the desire
for a definitive encounter with Christ, a desire which makes us always ready,
with our spirit awake, because we wait with all our heart, with every fibre of
our being for this encounter. This is a
fundamental aspect of life. There is a
desire which all of us have in our heart; whether explicit or implicit, we all
have this desire in our hearts. It is
also important that we understand this teaching of Jesus in concrete terms, in
the concrete existential context in which he taught it. In this case, the evangelist Luke shows us Jesus
who is walking with his disciples toward Jerusalem, towards the Passover of his
death and resurrection, and on this journey, he teaches them, confiding to them
that which He himself has in his heart, the deepest and most intimate attitudes
of his own soul. Among these attitudes,
is detachment from earthly goods, confidence in the Father’s providence and
specifically, interior vigilance, the active expectation of the Kingdom of
God. For Jesus this is expressed as an
expectation of returning to the Father’s house.
For us, this is the expectation of Christ himself, who will come to take
us to the feast without end, as he has already done with his Mother, Mary most
Holy: he has taken her to heaven with him.
This gospel tells us that a Christian is one who carries
within himself a great desire, a profound desire: the desire to encounter his
Lord and his brothers, his companions on the journey. All that Jesus says can be summed up in one
of the most well-known of Jesus’ sayings: Where
ever your treasure is, there also will your heart be (Lk 12:34). The heart that desires … But all of us have a
desire! Poor are the people who have no
desire! The desire to go forward, toward
the horizon, and for us Christians, this horizon is the encounter with Jesus,
the personal encounter with Him who is our life, our joy, the one who makes us
happy. I want to ask two questions. The first: all of you, do you have a desiring
heart, a heart that desires? Think about
it and answer in silence, in the silence of your heart: do you have a desiring
heart, or a closed heart, a heart that is asleep, a heart that is anesthetized
against the possibility of life? Desire:
go forward, go out and meet Jesus. And
the second question: where is your treasure, the treasure you desire? – Because
Jesus said: Where your treasure is, there
your heart will be – and I would ask: where is your treasure? What is the most important reality for you,
the most precious, the reality that attracts my heart like a magnet? What tugs at your heart? Can I say that it is the love of God? Do you have the desire to do good for others,
to live for the Lord and for our brothers?
Can I say this? Every person must
answer in the silence of his heart. But
someone might say to me: Father, I am one who works, who has a family, for me
the most important thing is the betterment of my family, to get ahead at work …
Sure, this is true, this is important.
But what is the strength that holds the family together? Love, and the one who plants love in our
hearts is God, the love of God: the love of God helps us to make sense of the
little daily tasks we accomplish, and it is love that helps us to face the
greater tests. This is man’s greatest
treasure: to go forward in life with love, with the love that the Lord has
planted in our hearts, with the love of God.
This is the true treasure. But
what is the love of God? It is not
something vague, a generic feeling. The
love of God has a name and a face: Jesus Christ, Jesus.
The love of God is manifested in Jesus. Why can we not love the air … Do we love the
air? Do we love everything? No, we can’t!
We love people, and the person we love is Jesus, the gift that the
Father gives to us. This is a love that
gives value and beauty to everything else; a love that strengthens the family,
work, study, friendship, art, every human activity. It gives meaning also to negative experiences
because this love permits us to go beyond them, not to remain prisoners of evil
but to go beyond, to open ourselves to hope.
The love of God in Jesus always opens us to hope, to the horizon of
hope, the final horizon of our pilgrimage.
In this way, even our struggles and falls find meaning. Even our sins find meaning in the context of
God’s love, because the love of god in Jesus Christ always forgives; it loves
so much that it always forgives.
Dear brothers, today the Church remembers Saint Clare of
Assisi, who in the footsteps of Francis left everything else in order to consecrate
herself to Christ in poverty. Saint
Clare gives us a very beautiful testimony to today’s gospel: may she help us, together
with the Virgin Mary, to live, each according to his own vocation.
Following the
recitation of the Angelus, the Holy Father continued:
Dear brothers and sisters,
Let us remember that next Thursday is the Solemnity of the
Assumption of Mary. Let us think about
our Mother, who has already arrived in heaven with Jesus, and let us celebrate
with her on Thursday.
I want to greet all the Muslims in the world, our
brothers, who recently celebrated the conclusion of the month of Ramadan,
dedicated in a special way to fasting, to prayer and to almsgiving. As I wrote in my Message for this occasion, I
wish that all Christians and Muslims might work toward promoting reciprocal
respect, especially pertaining to the education of the new generations.
I affectionately greet all the Romans and pilgrims
present. Today, I also have the joy of
greeting a few groups of young people: among them, those who have come from
Chicago on a pilgrimage to Lourdes and to Rome; and the youth from Locate, from
Predore and Tavernola Bergamasca, and the Scouts from Vittoria. I also repeat to you the words that were the
theme of the great encounter in Rio: Go,
make disciples of all the nations.
To all of you, and to everyone, I wish you a good Sunday. Enjoy your lunch! Good bye!
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