Pope Visits Rome's Major Seminary

(02 Feb 08 - RV) Pope Benedict XVI journeyed across the Tiber yesterday evening to Romes’ Major Seminary near the Cathedral St John Latern.

Each year the Holy Father visits the rector, priests, deacons and seminarians of his diocese for the feast of Our Lady of trust, patroness of the seminary.

After celebrating evening prayer together, Pope Benedict XVI urged the hundreds of young men to “open their souls to truth, transparency and dialogue with those who guide their priestly formation”.

Only in this way, he said, will they be “capable of responding to God with simplicity and humility and free themselves of the risk that their journey towards the priesthood become a personal project”.

A candidate to the priesthood on average can spend up to 7 years in the seminary. Pope Benedict XVI described these years as a “precious oasis of silence, reflection and prayer, a “desert” detached from community life so that those who have been called to follow the Lord may her his voice which is quiet in the midst of noise”. The Holy Father urged the students to “use this time to meditate on the Gospels”, to “deepen their knowledge and understanding of the liturgy and Eucharistic adoration”. He noted that the seminary demands “long years of study and prayer”, but he added “it is only through study and prayer that you can become the man of God that you must and which people expect a priest to be”.

Pope Benedict then turned to the sense of community, vital to the life of all seminaries. Just as the apostles he said “you must learn together how to follow Christ”. But he added your community,” is not limited to the present it also regards the future; the pastoral work to which you have been called requires that you act as one body, one ordo, together with your bishop for the good of the Christian community”.

The Pope concluded his speech reaching out to the families of the students gathered together with their son’s in the seminary chapel. He remarked that perhaps some parents were surprised by their child’s choice, perhaps they had imagined a different future for him. But he told the mothers and fathers, “you are intimately involved in your son’s journey, his vocation is your vocation you are participants in his wonderful adventure, which concluded the pope is one of the most interesting and necessary in today’s world”.

Saturday evening the Holy Father is due to address religious gathered for Mass in the Vatican Basilica to mark the feast of the Presentation of Our Lord and World Day for Religious.