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A Service to God's Joy
On Sunday morning, 24 April, Pope Benedict XVI celebrated Holy
Mass for the faithful in St Peter's Square as part of the beginning of
his Petrine Ministry. During the liturgy, the Pontiff received the
Pallium and Fisherman's Ring, ancient symbols of his inauguration, and
explained the deep significance of both, and of his own role as
Successor of Peter. The following is a translation of the Holy Father's
Homily, given in Italian.
Your Eminences,
My dear Brother Bishops and Priests,
Distinguished Authorities and Members of the Diplomatic Corps,
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
During these days of great intensity, we have chanted the Litany of
the Saints on three different occasions: at the funeral of our Holy
Father John Paul II; as the Cardinals entered the Conclave; and again
today, when we sang it with the response: Tu illum adiuva
sustain the new Successor of Saint Peter. On each occasion, in a
particular way, I found great consolation in listening to this prayerful
chant.
We are not alone
How alone we all felt after the passing of John Paul II
the Pope who for over 26 years had been our shepherd and guide on our
journey through life! He crossed the threshold of the next life,
entering into the mystery of God.
But he did not take this step alone. Those who believe are never
alone
neither in life nor in death. At that moment, we could call upon the
Saints from every age
his friends, his brothers and sisters in the faith
knowing that they would form a living procession to accompany him into
the next world, into the glory of God. We knew that his arrival was
awaited. Now we know that he is among his own and is truly at home.
We were also consoled as we made our solemn entrance into Conclave,
to elect the one whom the Lord had chosen. How would we be able to
discern his name? How could 115 Bishops, from every culture and every
country, discover the one on whom the Lord wished to confer the mission
of binding and loosing?
Once again, we knew that we were not alone, we knew that we were
surrounded, led and guided by the friends of God. And now, at this
moment, weak servant of God that I am, I must assume this enormous task,
which truly exceeds all human capacity. How can I do this? How will I be
able to do it?
All of you, my dear friends, have just invoked the entire hose of
Saints, represented by some of the great names in the history of God's
dealings with humankind. In this way, I too can say with renewed
conviction: I am not alone. I do not have to carry alone what in truth I
could never carry alone. All the Saints of God are there to protect me,
to sustain me and to carry me. And your prayers, my dear friends, your
indulgence, your love, your faith and your hope accompany me.
Indeed, the communion of Saints consists not only of the great men
and women who went before us and whose names we know. All of us belong
to the communion of Saints, we who have been baptized in the name of the
Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, we who draw life from the
gift of Christ's Body and Blood, through which he transforms us and
makes us like himself.
Yes, the Church is alive
this is the wonderful experience of these days. During those sad days of
the Pope's illness and death, it became wonderfully evident to us that
the Church is alive. And the Church is young. She holds within herself
the future of the world and therefore shows each of us the way towards
the future. The Church is alive and we are seeing it: we are
experiencing the joy that the Risen Lord promised his followers. The
Church is alive
she is alive because Christ is alive, because he is truly risen.
In the suffering that we saw on the Holy Father's face in those days
of Easter, we contemplated the mystery of Christ's Passion and we
touched his wounds. But throughout these days we have also been able, in
a profound sense, to touch the Risen One. We have been able to
experience the joy that he promised, after a brief period of darkness,
as the fruit of his Resurrection.
The Church is truly alive
The Church is alive
with these words, I greet with great joy and gratitude all of you
gathered here, my Venerable Brother Cardinals and Bishops, my dear
priests, deacons, Church workers, catechists. I greet you, men and women
Religious, witnesses of the transfiguring presence of God. I greet you,
members of the lay faithful, immersed in the great task of building up
the Kingdom of God which spreads throughout the world, in every area of
life. With great affection I also greet all those who have been reborn
in the sacrament of Baptism but are not yet in full communion with us;
and you, my brothers and sisters of the Jewish people, to whom we are
joined by a great shared spiritual heritage, one rooted in God's
irrevocable promises. Finally, like a wave gathering force, my thoughts
go out to all men and women of today, to believers and non-believers
alike.
Dear friends! At this moment there is no need for me to present a
programme of governance. I was able to give an indication of what I see
as my task in my Message of Wednesday, 20 April, and there will be other
opportunities to do so.
My real programme of governance is not to do my own will, not to
pursue my own ideas, but to listen, together with the whole Church, to
the word and the will of the Lord, to be guided by him, so that he
himself will lead the Church at this hour of our history. Instead of
putting forward a programme, I should simply like to comment on the two
liturgical symbols which represent the inauguration of the Petrine
Ministry; both these symbols, moreover, reflect clearly what we heard
proclaimed in today's readings.
Holy zeal to protect the sheep
The first symbol is the Pallium, woven in pure wool, that is placed
on my shoulders. This ancient sign, which the Bishops of Rome have worn
since the fourth century, may be considered an image of the yoke of
Christ, which the Bishop of this City, the Servant of the Servants of
God, takes upon his shoulders.
God's yoke is God's will, which we accept. And this will does not
weigh down on us, oppressing us and taking away our freedom. To know
what God wanes, to know where the path of life is found
this was Israel's joy, this was her great privilege. It is also our joy:
God's will does not alienate us, it purifies us
even if this can be painful - and so it leads us to ourselves. In this
way, we serve not only him, but the salvation of the whole world, of all
history.
The symbolism of the Pallium is even more concrete: the lamb's wool
is meant to represent the lost, sick or weak sheep which the shepherd
places on his shoulders and carries to the waters of life. For the
Fathers of the Church, the parable of the lost sheep, which the shepherd
seeks in the desert, was an image of the mystery of Christ and the
Church. The human race
every one of us
is the sheep lost in the desert which no longer knows the way. The Son
of God will not let this happen; he cannot abandon humanity in so
wretched a condition. He leaps to his feet and abandons the glory of
heaven, in order to go in search of the sheep and pursue it, all the way
to the Cross. He takes it upon his shoulders and carries our humanity;
he carries us all
he is the good shepherd who lays down his life for the sheep.
What the Pallium indicates first and foremost is that we are all
carried by Christ. But at the same time it invites us to carry one
another. Hence, the Pallium becomes a symbol of the shepherd's mission,
of which the Second Reading and the Gospel speak. The Pastor must be
inspired by Christ's holy zeal: for him it is not a matter of
indifference that so many people are living in the desert. And there are
so many kinds of deserts.
There is the desert of poverty, the desert of hunger and thirst, the
desert of abandonment, of loneliness, of destroyed love. There is the
desert of God's darkness, the emptiness of souls no longer aware of
their dignity or the goal of human life. The external deserts in the
world are growing, because the internal deserts have become so vast.
Therefore, the earth's treasures no longer serve to build God's
garden for all to live in, but they have been made to serve the powers
of exploitation and destruction. The Church as a whole and all her
Pastors, like Christ, must see out to lead people out of the desert,
towards the place of life, towards friendship with the Son of God,
towards the One who gives us life, and life in abundance.
Redeemed by the patience of God
The symbol of the lamb also has a deeper meaning. In the Ancient Near
East, it was customary for kings to style themselves shepherds of their
people. This was an image of their power, a cynical image: to them their
subjects were like sheep, which the shepherd could dispose of as he
wished. When the shepherd of all humanity, the living God, himself
became a lamb, he stood on the side of the lambs, with those who are
downtrodden and killed. This is how he reveals himself to be the true
shepherd: "I am the Good Shepherd... I lay down my life for the sheep",
Jesus says of himself (Jn 10:14ff.) It is not power, but love that
redeems us! This is God's sign: he himself is love.
How often we wish that God would show himself stronger, that he would
strike decisively, defeating evil and creating a better world. All
ideologies of power justify themselves in exactly this way: they justify
the destruction of whatever would stand in the way of progress and the
liberation of humanity. We suffer on account of God's patience. And yet,
we need his patience. God, who became a lamb, tells us that the world is
saved by the Crucified One, not by those who crucified him. The world is
redeemed by the patience of God; it is destroyed by the impatience of
man..
One of the basic characteristics of a shepherd must be to love the
people entrusted to him, even as he loves Christ whom he serves. "Feed
my sheep", says Christ to Peter, and now, at this moment, he says it to
me as well. Feeding means loving, and loving also means being ready to
suffer. Loving means giving the sheep what is truly good, the
nourishment of God's truth, of God's Word, the nourishment of his
presence, which he gives us in the Blessed Sacrament.
My dear friends, at this moment I can only say: pray for me, that I
may learn to love the Lord more and more. Pray for me that I may learn
to love more and more his flock: you, the holy Church, each one of you
and all of you together. Pray for me, that I may not flee for fear of
the wolves. Let us pray for one another, that the Lord will carry us and
that we will learn to carry one another.
From alienation to God's light
The second symbol used. in today's liturgy to express the
inauguration of the Petrine Ministry is the presentation of the
fisherman's ring. Peter's call to be a shepherd, which we heard in the
Gospel, comes after the account of a miraculous catch of fish: after a
night in which the disciples had let down their nets without success,
they see the Risen Lord on the shore. He tells them to let down their
nets once more, and the nets become so full that they can hardly pull
them in; 153 large fish: "and although there were so many, the net was
not torn" (Jn 21:11).
This account, coming at the end of Jesus' earthly journey with his
disciples, corresponds to an account found at the beginning: there too,
the disciples had caught nothing the entire night; there too, Jesus had
invited Simon once more to put out into the deep. And Simon, who was not
yet called Peter, gave the wonderful reply: "Master, at your word I will
let down the nets". And then came the conferral of his mission: "Do not
be afraid. Henceforth, you will be catching men" (cf. Lk 5:1-11).
Today too the Church and the successors of the Apostles are told to
put out into the deep sea of history and to let down the nets, so as to
win men and women over to the Gospel: to God, to Christ, to true life.
The Fathers made a very significant commentary on this singular task.
This is what they say: for a fish, created for water, it is fatal to be
taken out of the sea, to be removed from its vital element to serve as
human food. But in the mission of a fisher of men, the reverse is true.
We are living in alienation, in the salt waters of suffering and death;
in a sea of darkness without light. The net of the Gospel pulls us out
of the waters of death and brings us into the splendour of God's light,
into true life. It is really true: as we follow Christ it this mission
to be fishers of men, we must bring men and women out of the sea that is
salted with so many forms of alienation and onto the land of life, into
the light of God. It is really so: the purpose of our lives is to reveal
God to men. And only where God is seen doe:
life truly begin. Only when we meet the living God in Christ do we know
what life is.
We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of
us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed, each of us
is loved, each of us is necessary. There is nothing more beautiful than
to be surprised by the Gospel, by the encounter with Christ. There is
nothing more beautiful than to know him and to speak to others of our
friendship with him. The task of the shepherd, the task of the fisher of
men, can often seem wearisome. But it is beautiful and wonderful,
because it is truly a service to joy, to God's joy which longs to break
into the world.
Call to unity, courageous witness
Here I would like to add something: both the image of the shepherd
and that of the fisherman issue an explicit call to unity. "I have other
sheep that are not of this fold; I must lead them too, and they will
heed my voice. So there shall be one flock, one shepherd" (Jn 10:16);
these are the words of Jesus at the end of his discourse on the Good
Shepherd. And the account of the 153 large fish ends with the joyful
statement: "although there were so many, the net was not torn" (Jn
21:11).
Alas, beloved Lord, with sorrow we must now acknowledge that it has
been torn! But no
we must not be sad! Let us rejoice because of your promise, which does
not disappoint, and let us do all we can to pursue the path towards the
unity you have promised. Let us remember it in our prayer to the Lord,
as we plead with him: yes, Lord, remember your promise. Grant that we
may be one flock and one shepherd! Do not allow your net to be torn, and
help us to be servants of unity!
At this point, my thoughts return to 22 October 1978, when Pope John
Paul II began his ministry here in Saint Peter's Square. His words on
that occasion constantly echo in my ears: "Do not be afraid! Open wide
the doors to Christ!".
The Pope was addressing the mighty, the powerful of this world, who
feared that Christ might take away something of their power if they were
to let him in, if they were to allow the faith to be free. Yes, he would
certainly have taken something away from them: the dominion of
corruption, the manipulation of law and the freedom to do as they
pleased. But he would not have taken away anything that pertains to
human freedom or dignity, or to the building of a just society.
The Pope was also speaking to everyone, especially the young. Are we
not perhaps all afraid in some way? If we let Christ enter fully into
our lives, if we open ourselves totally to him, are we not afraid that
he might take something away from us? Are we not perhaps afraid to give
up something significant, something unique, something that makes life so
beautiful? Do we not then risk ending up diminished and deprived of our
freedom?
And once again the Pope said: No! If we let Christ into our lives, we
lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free,
beautiful and great. No! Only in this friendship are the doors of life
opened wide. Only in this friendship is the great potential of human
existence truly revealed. Only in this friendship do we experience
beauty and liberation.
And so, today, with great strength and great conviction, on the basis
of long personal experience of life, I say to you, dear young people: Do
not be afraid of Christ! He takes nothing away, and he gives you
everything. When we give ourselves to him, we receive a hundredfold in
return. Yes, open, open wide the doors to Christ
and you will
find true life. Amen.
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