SUMMARY:
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TO WALK, TO BUILD, TO WITNESS, ALWAYS WITH THE CROSS OF CHRIST
______________________________________
TO
WALK, TO BUILD, TO WITNESS, ALWAYS WITH THE CROSS OF CHRIST
Vatican
City, 14 March 2013 (VIS) – This afternoon, the Holy Father Francis
celebrated the “pro Ecclesia” Mass in the Sistine Chapel with the
114 Cardinal electors who participated in the Conclave and those who
assisted with its functions.
The
first reading was a canticle from the Prophet Isaiah that begins with
the words: “In days to come, the mountain of the Lord’s house
shall be established as the highest mountain” and continues with
the celebrated verses: “He shall judge between the nations, and set
terms for many peoples. They shall beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks; One nation shall not raise the
sword against another, nor shall they train for war again.” The
second reading was from the First Letter of Peter dedicated to the
common priesthood of the faithful, which reads: “like living
stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house to be a holy
priesthood” and exhorts us to be “a chosen race, a royal
priesthood, a holy nation, a people of His own, so that you may
announce the praises” of him who called you out of darkness into
His wonderful light”. The Gospel reading told the story of Peter's
confession when Christ asked His disciples: “And you, who do you
say I am?” and Peter answered “You are the Messiah, the Son of
the living God.” Jesus said to him in reply: “And so I say to
you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and
the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.”
In
his first homily as Pope, and speaking in Italian without a text,
Francis noted that the three readings have something in common:
“Movement. In the first reading the movement is the journey; in the
second the movement is the building of the Church; in the Gospel the
movement is in the witness. To walk, to build, to witness.”
The
pontiff recalled that the first thing God said to Abraham was: “'Walk
in my presence and be blameless.' Our life is a path. When we stop
walking there is something that isn't right. To walk always in the
presence of the Lord, in the light of the Lord, seeking to live the
blamelessness that God asks of Abraham in His promise.”
“To
build,” he continued, “to construct the Church. This means
stones. Stones are solid but these are living stones, stones that are
anointed by the Holy Spirit. To build the Church, the Bride of
Christ, on the cornerstone that is the Lord himself.”
“To
witness … We can walk when we want to, we can build many things,
but if we do not witness to Jesus Christ then it doesn't matter. We
might become a philanthropic NGO but we wouldn't be the Church, the
Bride of the Lord. When we don't go forward we stop...we go
backwards. When we don't build on rock, what happens? The same thing
that happens to children when they build sandcastles at the beach.
They wind up falling down because they have no solidity.” Then,
citing Leon Bloy, the Holy Father affirmed: “Whoever does not pray
to God, prays to the devil” because “when we don't witness to
Jesus Christ, we witness to the worldliness of the devil.”
“To
walk, to build, to witness. But this is not so easy because when we
walk, when we build, when we witness, at times there are upsets,
there are movements that aren't proper to the journey. They are
movements that pull us back.”
“In
the Gospel,” the Pope continued, “even Peter who confessed Jesus
as Christ, says to Him: 'You are the Messiah, the Son of the living
God. I will follow you but let's not talk about the Cross. That
doesn't have anything to do with it. … I'll follow you, without the
Cross.” But, “when we walk without the Cross, when we build
without the Cross, when we profess a Christ without the Cross … we
aren't disciples of the Lord. We are worldly, we are bishops,
priests, cardinals, popes, but not disciples of the Lord.”
“And
I wish that all of us, after these grace-filled days, might have the
courage, yes, the courage to walk in the Lord's presence with the
Cross of the Lord, to build the Church on the blood of the Lord that
is poured out on the Cross and to witness to the sole glory: to the
crucified Christ. And thus the Church will move forward.”
“I
wish for us all that the Holy Spirit, through the intercession of
Mary, our Mother, grant us this grace: to walk, to build, and to
witness to Jesus Christ.”
After
the homily, the Prayers of the Faithful prayed for the new pontiff
and also for His Holiness Benedict XVI, “that he may serve the
Church while hidden to the world, in a life dedicated to prayer and
meditation.” The also prayed that national leaders “not act with
force or for personal interest, not in tyranny over persons, but
conscious that every power comes from God.” Finally, they recalled
“those who are suffering and those who are lost in the struggles of
life. That Christ, the supreme Shepherd, may restore and console them
and crown them with glory.”
At
the end of the Mass the pontiff visited the papal apartment in the
Apostolic Palace.
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