At 11:30am today (5:30am EDT), in the Clementine Hall at the Vatican Apostolic Palace, the Holy Father, Pope Francis received in audience the priests from the Diocese of Créteil (France) who are on a pilgrimage in Rome.
Dear brothers and sisters, good morning!
With joy I welcome you on the first day of this rich and fraternal time that your Bishop and his Council have proposed to you to spend in Rome. I thank Bishop Santier for his words and for this initiative, and through you I extend my cordial greeting and my spiritual closeness to all the faithful of the Diocese of Créteil. Je lui disait: Vous êtes un évêque qui travaille! (I told him: 'You are a bishop at work!)
I wish first of all to give thanks to God who has called you and chosen you for the service of his Gospel (cf Rom 1: 1), to be faithful administrators of the mysteries of Christ among his people. We live in a context in which the boat that is the Church is being struck by contrary and violent winds, especially because of the serious faults committed by some of its members. It is all the more important not to forget our humble daily fidelity to the ministry that the Lord allows us to experience in the lives of the great majority of those who he has given to his Church as priests! We know that, responding to the Lord's call, we were not consecrated by the gift of the Spirit to be superheroes. We were sent with the awareness of being forgiven men, to become shepherds in the manner of Jesus: wounded, dead and risen, because our mission as ministers of the Church is - today as it was yesterday - to bear witness to the strength of the Resurrection in the wounds of this world. In this way we are called to progress humbly on the path of holiness, helping the disciples of Jesus Christ to respond to their baptismal vocation, so that they may be ever more missionaries, witnesses of the joy of the Gospel. After all, is this not the meaning of the diocesan Synod that you celebrated in 2016?
Dear friends, taking the time to reflect on the revision of the organization of your Diocese, do not be afraid to look at the wounds of our Church, not in order to complain, but to go up to Jesus Christ. He alone can heal us, allow us to start again from him and to find - with him and in him - the concrete means to propose his life to everyone, in a context of poverty and want. Because if something must radically worry us and worry our conscience, it is that so many of our brothers live without the strength, the light and the consolation of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of faith that welcomes them, without a horizon of meaning and life (Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, 49). In this perspective, insistently ask the Holy Spirit to guide you and enlighten you: He will help you, in the exercise of your ministry, to make the Church of Jesus Christ lovable and loving, according to the beautiful expression of the Venerable Madeleine Delbrȇl. With this strength coming from above, you will be urged to go out to make yourselves closer to everyone every day, especially those who are hurt, marginalized and excluded.
During your pilgrimage to Rome, you will discuss the revival of the pastoral care of vocations to the ordained ministry and to the consecrated life. Let us remember that where there is life, fervour and desire to bring Christ to others, genuine vocations arise" (EG, 107). But it is also through your way of living the ministry that you will allow young people to welcome the Lord's call to the priesthood or to the consecrated life. Therefore, I encourage you to keep your gaze fixed on Jesus Christ and to cultivate the particular bond that unites you to him, through personal prayer, listening to his Word, the celebration of the sacraments and the service of your brothers and sisters. It is important to foster and develop the quality of fraternal life among you and within your communities so that the value and beauty of ministry and of consecrated life are recognized by all people as a service of true missionary communion! Drawing from the source of the grace of your call and with the power of the Holy Spirit, you will be witnesses to that hope which does not disappoint (cf Rom 5:5), despite the difficulties and trials of every day; you will manifest, through your daily life, and even in the experience of your fragility, that the gift of life at the service of the Gospel and of your brothers is a source of joy that no one can take away from us. It transpires in you this joy which is deepened in friendship with the Lord and in constant renewed attention to others, especially the little ones and the poor. But above all, let yourselves be transformed and renewed by the Holy Spirit to recognize the word that the Lord Jesus wants to offer to the world through your life and your ministry (cf Apostolic Exhortation Gaudete et Exsultate, 24).
With this hope, I entrust you to the Lord, through the intercession of the Virgin Mary and the prayer of the Venerable Madeleine Delbrȇl, and I impart my Apostolic Blessing to you and to all the faithful of the Diocese of Créteil. And please, pray for me as I pray for you! Thank you.
(Original text in Italian; French translation by Libreria Editrice Vaticana)
Greetings of the Holy Father, Pope Francis
offered to priests from the Diocese of Créteil
Dear brothers and sisters, good morning!
With joy I welcome you on the first day of this rich and fraternal time that your Bishop and his Council have proposed to you to spend in Rome. I thank Bishop Santier for his words and for this initiative, and through you I extend my cordial greeting and my spiritual closeness to all the faithful of the Diocese of Créteil. Je lui disait: Vous êtes un évêque qui travaille! (I told him: 'You are a bishop at work!)
I wish first of all to give thanks to God who has called you and chosen you for the service of his Gospel (cf Rom 1: 1), to be faithful administrators of the mysteries of Christ among his people. We live in a context in which the boat that is the Church is being struck by contrary and violent winds, especially because of the serious faults committed by some of its members. It is all the more important not to forget our humble daily fidelity to the ministry that the Lord allows us to experience in the lives of the great majority of those who he has given to his Church as priests! We know that, responding to the Lord's call, we were not consecrated by the gift of the Spirit to be superheroes. We were sent with the awareness of being forgiven men, to become shepherds in the manner of Jesus: wounded, dead and risen, because our mission as ministers of the Church is - today as it was yesterday - to bear witness to the strength of the Resurrection in the wounds of this world. In this way we are called to progress humbly on the path of holiness, helping the disciples of Jesus Christ to respond to their baptismal vocation, so that they may be ever more missionaries, witnesses of the joy of the Gospel. After all, is this not the meaning of the diocesan Synod that you celebrated in 2016?
Dear friends, taking the time to reflect on the revision of the organization of your Diocese, do not be afraid to look at the wounds of our Church, not in order to complain, but to go up to Jesus Christ. He alone can heal us, allow us to start again from him and to find - with him and in him - the concrete means to propose his life to everyone, in a context of poverty and want. Because if something must radically worry us and worry our conscience, it is that so many of our brothers live without the strength, the light and the consolation of friendship with Jesus Christ, without a community of faith that welcomes them, without a horizon of meaning and life (Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, 49). In this perspective, insistently ask the Holy Spirit to guide you and enlighten you: He will help you, in the exercise of your ministry, to make the Church of Jesus Christ lovable and loving, according to the beautiful expression of the Venerable Madeleine Delbrȇl. With this strength coming from above, you will be urged to go out to make yourselves closer to everyone every day, especially those who are hurt, marginalized and excluded.
During your pilgrimage to Rome, you will discuss the revival of the pastoral care of vocations to the ordained ministry and to the consecrated life. Let us remember that where there is life, fervour and desire to bring Christ to others, genuine vocations arise" (EG, 107). But it is also through your way of living the ministry that you will allow young people to welcome the Lord's call to the priesthood or to the consecrated life. Therefore, I encourage you to keep your gaze fixed on Jesus Christ and to cultivate the particular bond that unites you to him, through personal prayer, listening to his Word, the celebration of the sacraments and the service of your brothers and sisters. It is important to foster and develop the quality of fraternal life among you and within your communities so that the value and beauty of ministry and of consecrated life are recognized by all people as a service of true missionary communion! Drawing from the source of the grace of your call and with the power of the Holy Spirit, you will be witnesses to that hope which does not disappoint (cf Rom 5:5), despite the difficulties and trials of every day; you will manifest, through your daily life, and even in the experience of your fragility, that the gift of life at the service of the Gospel and of your brothers is a source of joy that no one can take away from us. It transpires in you this joy which is deepened in friendship with the Lord and in constant renewed attention to others, especially the little ones and the poor. But above all, let yourselves be transformed and renewed by the Holy Spirit to recognize the word that the Lord Jesus wants to offer to the world through your life and your ministry (cf Apostolic Exhortation Gaudete et Exsultate, 24).
With this hope, I entrust you to the Lord, through the intercession of the Virgin Mary and the prayer of the Venerable Madeleine Delbrȇl, and I impart my Apostolic Blessing to you and to all the faithful of the Diocese of Créteil. And please, pray for me as I pray for you! Thank you.
(Original text in Italian; French translation by Libreria Editrice Vaticana)
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