This morning's General Audience began at 9:20am in Saint Peter's Square, where the Holy Father, Pope Francis met with groups of pilgrims and the faithful from Italy and from every corner of the world.
In his speech, the Pope focused on the theme: Vigilant waiting.
After having summarized his catechesis in various languages, the Holy Father offered greetings to each group of the faithful in attendance. He then invited all those gathered to recite the Rosary with a special intention for peace in the world, recalling the closing celebrations for the Centenary of the final Marian apparitions at Fatima that are being commemorated on Friday, October 13 and marking the International Day for the Reduction of Natural Disasters.
The General Audience concluded with the chanting of the Pater Noster and the Apostolic blessing.
Dear brothers and sisters, good morning!
Today, I want to focus on particular dimension of hope, that of vigilant waiting. The theme of vigilance is one of the common threads that runs through the New Testament. Jesus preaches to his disciples: Be ready, gird your loins and have your lamps lit; be like servants awaiting the return of their master, so that when he returns and knocks, you can open the door immediately (Lk 12:35-36). In this time that followed Jesus' resurrection, in which moments of serenity and anger alternated, Christians never gave up. The gospel encourages us to be like servants who never go to bed, until their master has returned. The world requires us to be responsible, and we take on this responsibility completely and lovingly. Jesus wants our existence to be labourious, that we never let down our guard, in order to welcome every new day that God gives us with gratitude and amazement. Every morning is a blank page that the Christian begins to write with good works. We have already been saved by the redemption of Jesus, but now we await the full manifestation of his lordship: when God will finally be all in all (cf 1 Cor 15:28). Nothing is more certain in the faith of Christians, than this appointment, this appointment with the Lord, when he comes. And when that day arrives, we Christians want to be like those servants who had spent the night with their loins girded and their lamps lit: we need to be ready for the salvation that is to come, ready for this encounter. Have you ever thought about how that meeting with Jesus will go, when we see him? It will be an embrace, an enormous joy, a great joy! We should live in anticipation of this encounter!
Christians are not made for boredom; rather we are created for patience. We know that even in the monotony of certain days, there is always a hidden mystery of grace. There are people who, with the perseverance of their love, become like wells that water the desert. Nothing happens in vain, and no situation in which a Christian may be immersed is completely devoid of love. No night is so long that we will forget the joy of the dawn. And the more dark the night is, the closer we are to the dawn. If we remain united to Jesus, the chill of difficult moments will never paralyze us; and even if the entire world were to preach against hope, believing that the future would only bring dark clouds, the Christian knows that in this same future, there will be the return of Christ. When this will take place, no one knows, but at the end of our history there will always be our merciful God. It is enough for us to have faith and not to curse life. Everyone will be saved. Everyone. We will be fine, there will be moments of anger and indignation, but the sweet and powerful memory of Christ will entice even the temptation to think that this life is wrong.
After having known Jesus, we cannot do otherwise than to examine history with trust and hope. Jesus is like a house, and we are inside, and from the window of this house we look out at the world. So it is that we do not return to closing ourselves inside of own concerns, we do not regret the loss of a gilded past, but we always look ahead, to a future that is not only the work of our hands, but one that is first and foremost a constant concern of the providence of God. Everything that is unclear will one day come into the light.
And we know that God does not deny himself. Never. God never misleads. His will for us is not nebulous, it is a well-thought-out plan for salvation: God wills that all mankind should be saved and should come to know the truth (1 Tim 2:4). This is the reason why we do not give up on the flow of events in a pessimistic way, but rather it is as though history were a train that has lost control. Resignation is not a Christian virtue, just as it is not Christian to raise our shoulders or to bow our heads in the face of a destiny that seems inevitable.
Those who give people reasons to hope are never themselves remorseful. Jesus said that we should wait for them but not with our hands in our pockets: Blessed are those servants who the master finds awake when he returns (Lk 12:37). There is no artisan of peace who, in the end, has not compromised his own peace, taking on the problems of others. The person who is remorseful is not an artisan of peace but rather he is lazy, one who wants to be comfortable. While Christians are artisans of peace, when they take risks, when they have the courage to risk in order to be bearers of good, the good that Jesus has already shared with us, we discover that he has given us a treasure.
Every day of our lives, we repeat the invocation that the first disciples, in their Aramaic language, expressed with the word Marana tha - a word that we find in the final verses of the bible: Come, Lord Jesus! (Rev 22:20). This is the refrain of every Christian existence: in our world we do not need anything except for a caress from Christ. What a grace it would be if, in our prayer, on days that are difficult in this life, we could hear his voice responding and reassuring us: Here I am, I am coming soon (Rev 22:7)!
The Holy Father's catechesis was then summarized in various languages and His Holiness offered greetings to each group of the faithful in attendance. To English-speaking pilgrims, he said:
I greet the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors taking part in today’s Audience, especially those from England, Scotland, Demark, Australia, India, Indonesia, Japan, the Philippines, Canada and the United States of America. In particular I greet those who will be celebrating World Sight Day tomorrow, and I assure all who are blind and visually impaired of my closeness and prayers. Upon you and your families, I invoke the grace of the Lord Jesus, that you may be steadfast in hope and trust in God’s providence in your lives. May God bless you all!
At the conclusion of the Audience, the Holy Father issued the following call for prayer:
Next Friday, 13 October, will mark the one hundredth anniversary of the final Marian apparition at Fatima. With our eyes turned toward the mother of the Lord and the Queen of Missions, I invite everyone, especially during this month of October, to pray the Holy Rosary for the intention of peace in the world. May our prayer move the most rebellious of souls to banish all violence from their hearts, from their words or from their gestures, and to build together a non-violent community that takes care of our common home. Nothing is impossible if we turn to God in prayer. Everyone can be an artisan of peace (Message for the 50th World Day of Peace, 1 January 2017).
On that same day, 13 October, the International Day for the Reduction of Natural Disasters will be observed. I renew my impassioned call for the safeguarding of all creation through a more attentive caring for the environment. Therefore, I encourage all Institutions and those who have public and social responsibility to promote more and more a culture that is focused on reducing our exposure to risks and to natural disasters. Concrete actions which are needed in order to study and to defend our common home, can progressively reduce the risks faced by the most vulnerable of our populations.
In his speech, the Pope focused on the theme: Vigilant waiting.
After having summarized his catechesis in various languages, the Holy Father offered greetings to each group of the faithful in attendance. He then invited all those gathered to recite the Rosary with a special intention for peace in the world, recalling the closing celebrations for the Centenary of the final Marian apparitions at Fatima that are being commemorated on Friday, October 13 and marking the International Day for the Reduction of Natural Disasters.
The General Audience concluded with the chanting of the Pater Noster and the Apostolic blessing.
Catechesis of the Holy Father, Pope Francis
for the General Audience
Dear brothers and sisters, good morning!
Today, I want to focus on particular dimension of hope, that of vigilant waiting. The theme of vigilance is one of the common threads that runs through the New Testament. Jesus preaches to his disciples: Be ready, gird your loins and have your lamps lit; be like servants awaiting the return of their master, so that when he returns and knocks, you can open the door immediately (Lk 12:35-36). In this time that followed Jesus' resurrection, in which moments of serenity and anger alternated, Christians never gave up. The gospel encourages us to be like servants who never go to bed, until their master has returned. The world requires us to be responsible, and we take on this responsibility completely and lovingly. Jesus wants our existence to be labourious, that we never let down our guard, in order to welcome every new day that God gives us with gratitude and amazement. Every morning is a blank page that the Christian begins to write with good works. We have already been saved by the redemption of Jesus, but now we await the full manifestation of his lordship: when God will finally be all in all (cf 1 Cor 15:28). Nothing is more certain in the faith of Christians, than this appointment, this appointment with the Lord, when he comes. And when that day arrives, we Christians want to be like those servants who had spent the night with their loins girded and their lamps lit: we need to be ready for the salvation that is to come, ready for this encounter. Have you ever thought about how that meeting with Jesus will go, when we see him? It will be an embrace, an enormous joy, a great joy! We should live in anticipation of this encounter!
Christians are not made for boredom; rather we are created for patience. We know that even in the monotony of certain days, there is always a hidden mystery of grace. There are people who, with the perseverance of their love, become like wells that water the desert. Nothing happens in vain, and no situation in which a Christian may be immersed is completely devoid of love. No night is so long that we will forget the joy of the dawn. And the more dark the night is, the closer we are to the dawn. If we remain united to Jesus, the chill of difficult moments will never paralyze us; and even if the entire world were to preach against hope, believing that the future would only bring dark clouds, the Christian knows that in this same future, there will be the return of Christ. When this will take place, no one knows, but at the end of our history there will always be our merciful God. It is enough for us to have faith and not to curse life. Everyone will be saved. Everyone. We will be fine, there will be moments of anger and indignation, but the sweet and powerful memory of Christ will entice even the temptation to think that this life is wrong.
After having known Jesus, we cannot do otherwise than to examine history with trust and hope. Jesus is like a house, and we are inside, and from the window of this house we look out at the world. So it is that we do not return to closing ourselves inside of own concerns, we do not regret the loss of a gilded past, but we always look ahead, to a future that is not only the work of our hands, but one that is first and foremost a constant concern of the providence of God. Everything that is unclear will one day come into the light.
And we know that God does not deny himself. Never. God never misleads. His will for us is not nebulous, it is a well-thought-out plan for salvation: God wills that all mankind should be saved and should come to know the truth (1 Tim 2:4). This is the reason why we do not give up on the flow of events in a pessimistic way, but rather it is as though history were a train that has lost control. Resignation is not a Christian virtue, just as it is not Christian to raise our shoulders or to bow our heads in the face of a destiny that seems inevitable.
Those who give people reasons to hope are never themselves remorseful. Jesus said that we should wait for them but not with our hands in our pockets: Blessed are those servants who the master finds awake when he returns (Lk 12:37). There is no artisan of peace who, in the end, has not compromised his own peace, taking on the problems of others. The person who is remorseful is not an artisan of peace but rather he is lazy, one who wants to be comfortable. While Christians are artisans of peace, when they take risks, when they have the courage to risk in order to be bearers of good, the good that Jesus has already shared with us, we discover that he has given us a treasure.
Every day of our lives, we repeat the invocation that the first disciples, in their Aramaic language, expressed with the word Marana tha - a word that we find in the final verses of the bible: Come, Lord Jesus! (Rev 22:20). This is the refrain of every Christian existence: in our world we do not need anything except for a caress from Christ. What a grace it would be if, in our prayer, on days that are difficult in this life, we could hear his voice responding and reassuring us: Here I am, I am coming soon (Rev 22:7)!
The Holy Father's catechesis was then summarized in various languages and His Holiness offered greetings to each group of the faithful in attendance. To English-speaking pilgrims, he said:
I greet the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors taking part in today’s Audience, especially those from England, Scotland, Demark, Australia, India, Indonesia, Japan, the Philippines, Canada and the United States of America. In particular I greet those who will be celebrating World Sight Day tomorrow, and I assure all who are blind and visually impaired of my closeness and prayers. Upon you and your families, I invoke the grace of the Lord Jesus, that you may be steadfast in hope and trust in God’s providence in your lives. May God bless you all!
At the conclusion of the Audience, the Holy Father issued the following call for prayer:
Next Friday, 13 October, will mark the one hundredth anniversary of the final Marian apparition at Fatima. With our eyes turned toward the mother of the Lord and the Queen of Missions, I invite everyone, especially during this month of October, to pray the Holy Rosary for the intention of peace in the world. May our prayer move the most rebellious of souls to banish all violence from their hearts, from their words or from their gestures, and to build together a non-violent community that takes care of our common home. Nothing is impossible if we turn to God in prayer. Everyone can be an artisan of peace (Message for the 50th World Day of Peace, 1 January 2017).
On that same day, 13 October, the International Day for the Reduction of Natural Disasters will be observed. I renew my impassioned call for the safeguarding of all creation through a more attentive caring for the environment. Therefore, I encourage all Institutions and those who have public and social responsibility to promote more and more a culture that is focused on reducing our exposure to risks and to natural disasters. Concrete actions which are needed in order to study and to defend our common home, can progressively reduce the risks faced by the most vulnerable of our populations.
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