Christianity is the proclamation of the victory of life over death: Pope

December 08, 2012: “Christianity is essentially a "gospel", a "good news", while some think it is an obstacle to joy, because they see it as a series of prohibitions and rules. In fact, Christianity is the proclamation of the victory of grace over sin, of life over death”, said pope Benedict XVI on Saturday evening while making his customary at the Spanish steps on the feast of Mary Immaculate. We come together - Romans, pilgrims and visitors - at the foot of the statue of our spiritual mother, which makes us feel united in the name of faith.
Reflecting on the Gospel of the Annunciation, he said the fact that the decisive moment for the future of humanity, the moment when God became man and is surrounded by a great silence. The encounter between the divine messenger and the Immaculate Virgin goes completely unnoticed: nobody knows, nobody talks about it. It 'an event which, if it happened in our time, would not leave traces in newspapers and magazines, it is a mystery that happens in silence. What often goes unnoticed is really great and the quiet silence is more fruitful than the frenzy that characterizes our city.
That activism which makes us unable to stop, be quiet, listen to the silence in which the Lord makes his discreet voice. The day Mary received the announcement, she was all collected at the same time open to listening to God, there is nothing that separated her from God. This is the meaning of she being without original sin: his relationship with God is free from even the slightest flaw, there is no separation, there is no shadow of selfishness, but a perfect harmony.
We come to this monument to Mary, in the center of Rome, first of all to remind us that God's voice is not recognized in the noise and agitation, His design on our personal and social life is not perceived remaining on the surface, but going to a deeper level, where the forces are not economic or political, but moral and spiritual ones. That’s where Mary invites us to go and tune into the action of God.
The Immaculate Mary also tells us that when we are here, that the salvation of the world is not the work of man - science, technology, ideology - but it is by grace. Grace means love in its purity and beauty.
Mary is called "full of grace" (Lk 1:28) and this identity reminds us of the primacy of God in our lives and in the history of the world. It reminds us that the power of God's love is stronger than evil and it can fill in the gaps that selfishness causes in the history of individuals, families, nations and the world. The false solutions that the world offers to fill those gaps - is emblematic of the drug - in fact widen the chasm. Only love can save us from this fall, but not any love, a love that has in it the purity of Grace. Mary tells us that, as far as man can fall down, it's never too low for God, who came down to the netherworld.

And here comes the third thing which tells us about Immaculate Mary: it speaks of the joy, the real joy that spreads in the heart freed from sin. Sin brings with it sadness, while grace brings true joy that does not depend on the possession of things but is rooted in the depths of the person, and that nothing and no one can it take away.