Pope Francis' homily: Be filled with an evangelical, ecclesial, missionary spirit
(Vatican Radio) Below please find the complete text of Pope Francis’ Homily
for the Sixth Sunday of Easter, at Mass dedicated, during this Year of Faith, for
Confraternities and Popular Piety:
Homily of the Holy Father Sixth
Sunday of Easter Confraternities (Saint Peter’s Square, 5 May
2013)
Dear Brothers and Sisters, you were very courageous to come
with this rain. . . . May the Lord bless you very much! As part of the journey
of the Year of Faith, I am happy to celebrate this Eucharist dedicated in a
special way to confraternities: a traditional reality in the Church, which in recent
times has experienced renewal and rediscovery. I greet all of you with affection,
particularly the confraternities which have come here from all over the world! Thank
you for your presence and your witness!
1. In the Gospel we heard a passage
from the farewell discourses of Jesus, as related by the evangelist John in the context
of the Last Supper. Jesus entrusts his last thoughts, as a spiritual testament, to
the apostles before he leaves them. Today’s text makes it clear that Christian faith
is completely centred on the relationship between the Father, the Son and the Holy
Spirit. Whoever loves the Lord Jesus welcomes him and his Father interiorly, and thanks
to the Holy Spirit receives the Gospel in his or her heart and life. Here we are shown
the centre from which everything must go forth and to which everything must lead:
loving God and being Christ’s disciples by living the Gospel. When Benedict XVI spoke
to you, he used this expression: evangelical spirit. Dear confraternities, the popular
piety of which you are an important sign is a treasure possessed by the Church, which
the bishops of Latin America defined, significantly, as a spirituality, a form of
mysticism, which is “a place of encounter with Jesus Christ”. Draw always from Christ,
the inexhaustible wellspring; strengthen your faith by attending to your spiritual
formation, to personal and communitarian prayer, and to the liturgy. Down the centuries
confraternities have been crucibles of holiness for countless people who have lived
in utter simplicity an intense relationship with the Lord. Advance with determination
along the path of holiness; do not rest content with a mediocre Christian life, but
let your affiliation serve as a stimulus, above all for you yourselves, to an ever
greater love of Jesus Christ.
2. The passage of the Acts of the Apostles which
we heard also speaks to us about what is essential. In the early Church there was
immediately a need to discern what was essential about being a Christian, about following
Christ, and what is not. The apostles and the other elders held an important meeting
in Jerusalem, a first “council”, on this theme, to discuss the problems which arose
after the Gospel had been preached to the pagans, to non-Jews. It was a providential
opportunity for better understanding what is essential, namely, belief in Jesus Christ
who died and rose for our sins, and loving him as he loved us. But note how the difficulties
were overcome: not from without, but from within the Church. And this brings up a
second element which I want to remind you of, as Benedict XVI did, namely: ecclesial
spirit. Popular piety is a road which leads to what is essential, if it is lived in
the Church in profound communion with your pastors. Dear brothers and sisters, the
Church loves you! Be an active presence in the community, as living cells, as living
stones. The Latin American Bishops wrote that the popular piety which you reflect
is “a legitimate way of living the faith, a way of feeling that we are part of the
Church” (Aparecida Document, 264). And this is beautiful, eh? A legitimate
way of living the faith, a way of feeling that you are a part of the Church. Love
the Church! Let yourselves be guided by her! In your parishes, in your dioceses, be
a true “lung” of faith and Christian life. A breath of fresh air. . . . In this Square
I see a great variety, first of umbrellas, and then of colors and signs. This is also
the case with the Church: a great wealth and variety of expressions in which everything
leads back to unity, the variety leads back to unity and unity to the encounter with
Christ.
3. I would like to add a third expression which must distinguish you:
missionary spirit. You have a specific and important mission, that of keeping alive
the relationship between the faith and the cultures of the peoples to whom you belong.
You do this through popular piety. When, for example, you carry the crucifix in procession
with such great veneration and love for the Lord, you are not performing a simple
outward act; you are pointing to the centrality of the Lord’s paschal mystery, his
passion, death and resurrection which have redeemed us, and you are reminding yourselves
first, as well as the community, that we have to follow Christ along the concrete
path of our daily lives so that he can transform us. Likewise, when you express profound
devotion for the Virgin Mary, you are pointing to the highest realization of the Christian
life, the one who by her faith and obedience to God’s will, and by her meditation
on the words and deeds of Jesus, is the Lord’s perfect disciple (cf. Lumen Gentium,
53). You express this faith, born of hearing the word of God, in ways that engage
the senses, the emotions and the symbols of the different cultures. . . . In doing
so you help to transmit it to others, and especially the simple persons whom, in the
Gospels, Jesus calls “the little ones”. In effect, “journeying together towards shrines,
and participating in other demonstrations of popular piety, bringing along your children
and engaging other people, is itself a work of evangelization” (Aparecida Document,
264). When you go to the shrines, when you bring the family, your children, you are
doing the proper work of evangelization. You must go on doing so! May you also be
true evangelizers! May your initiatives be “bridges”, means of bringing others to
Christ, so as to journey together with him. And in this spirit may you always be attentive
to charity. Each individual Christian and every community is missionary to the extent
that they bring to others and live the Gospel, and testify to God’s love for all,
especially those experiencing difficulties. Be missionaries of God’s love and tenderness!
You are missionaries of the Mercy of God, which always pardons us, always awaits us.
. . . He loves us so much!
Evangelical spirit, ecclesial spirit, missionary
spirit. Three words – don’t forget them: Evangelical spirit, ecclesial spirit, missionary
spirit. Let us ask the Lord always to direct our minds and hearts to him, as living
stones of the Church, so that all that we do, our whole Christian life, may be a luminous
witness to his mercy and love. In this way we will make our way towards the goal of
our earthly pilgrimage, towards that most beautiful sanctuary, the heavenly Jerusalem.
There, there is no longer any temple: God himself and the Lamb are its temple; and
the light of the sun and the moon give way to the glory of the Most High. Amen.