2010-02-08 14:34:21

Pope’s Sunday ‘Angelus’ of Feb. 7


(February 08, 2010) Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday urged priests not to focus on their limitations but to look up to Christ and his wonderful mercy, to convert the hearts and continue to joyfully leave everything to Him. Speaking to a large crowd gathered in St. Peter’s Square to pray the weekly midday ‘Angelus’ prayer with him, the Pope reflected on Sunday’s Mass readings. Drawing from the experiences of Isaiah and Sts. Peter and. Paul, the Holy Father noted how a genuine encounter with God leads man to recognize his own inadequacy, poverty, limits and sin. But, despite this weakness, the Lord, full of mercy and forgiveness, transforms the life of man and calls him to be His intrepid apostle and herald of salvation. "In this Year for Priests, the Pope said, we pray to the Lord of the harvest to send labourers for His harvest, so those who hear the Lord's invitation to follow him, after the necessary discernment, will respond with generosity, not trusting in their strength, but opening themselves to the action of His grace.
After praying the ‘Angelus’ the Pope said he was joining in the observance of the Day for Life by the Italian Bishops, on the theme, 'The force of life, a challenge in poverty'. The Pope noted that during the current period of economic difficulty, those mechanisms that lead to poverty and create great social inequalities become even more dramatic, hurting and offending life, affecting especially the weakest and most defenceless. This situation, therefore, commits us to promote integral human development to overcome poverty and need, and above all to remember that man’s goal is not wellbeing, but God, and that human life must be defended and promoted in every stage. No one is master of his own life, but we are all called to preserve and respect it, from the moment of conception until its natural end". The Pope also wished the success of the "Week for life and family" by Rome diocese, encouraging “the activities of clinics, associations and movements, as well as university teachers engaged in support of life and family." In this regard he reminded all that on the Church’s World Day for the Sick, February 11, on the feast of the Blessed Virgin of Lourdes on Thursday, he would be celebrating Mass with the sick in St. Peter’s Basilica.







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