Pope at Mass: John the Baptist a model for the Church
(Vatican Radio) The church exists for courageously proclaiming -until martyrdom- Christ,
to serve and "take nothing for herself". In his homily at morning Mass on Monday,
Pope Francis pointed to St. John the Baptist as model for Church: he didn't claim
the Truth, the Word as his own; he diminished himself so Christ could shine.
June
24th is the Solemnity of the Birth of the Saint, whom the Gospels indicate
as the forerunner or precursor of Jesus. Dedicating his homily to him Pope Francis
said the Church is called to proclaim the Word of God, even to martyrdom.
Pope
Francis began his homily by addressing best wishes to all who bear the name John.
The figure of John the Baptist, the Pope said, is not always easy to understand. "When
we think of his life - he observed – we think of a prophet," a "man who was great
and then ends up as a poor man." Who is John? The Pope said john himself explains:
"I am a voice, a voice in the wilderness," but "it is a voice without the Word, because
the Word is not him, it is an Other." Here then is the mystery of John: "He never
takes over the Word," John "is the one who indicates, who marks". The "meaning of
John's life - he added - is to indicate another." Pope Francis then spoke of being
struck by the fact that the "Church chooses to mark John’s feast day” at a time when
the days are at their longest in the year, when they "have more light." And John
really "was the man of light, he brought light, but it was not his own light, it was
a reflected light." John is "like a moon" and when Jesus began to preach, the light
of John "began to decline, to set". "Voice not Word - the Pope said - light, but not
his own"
"John seems to be nothing. That is John’s vocation: he
negates himself. And when we contemplate the life of this man, so great, so
powerful - all believed that he was the Messiah - when we contemplate this life, how
it is nullified to the point of the darkness of a prison, we behold a great mystery.
We do not know what John’s last days were like. We do not know. We only know that
he was killed, his head was put on a platter, as a great gift from a dancer to an
adulteress. I don’t think you can lower yourself much more than this, negate yourself
much more. That was the end that John met".
Pope Francis noted that
in prison John experienced doubts, anguish and he called on his disciples to go to
Jesus and ask him, "Are you You, or should we expect someone else?". His life is one
of “pain and darkness”. John “was not even spared this”, said the Pope, who added:
"the figure of John makes me think so much about the Church":
"The Church
exists to proclaim, to be the voice of a Word, her husband, who is the Word. The Church
exists to proclaim this Word until martyrdom. Martyrdom precisely in the hands of
the proud, the proudest of the Earth. John could have made himself important, he could
have said something about himself. 'But I never think', only this: he indicated, he
felt himself to be the voice, not the Word. This is John’s secret. Why is John holy
and without sin? Because he never, never took a truth as his own. He would not be
an ideologue. The man who negated himself so that the Word could come to the fore.
And we, as a Church, we can now ask for the grace not to become an ideological Church
... "
The Church, he added, must hear the Word of Jesus and raise her
voice, proclaim it boldly. "That - he said - is the Church without ideologies, without
a life of its own: the Church which is the mysterium lunae which has light
from her Bridegroom and diminish herself so that He may grow"
"This
is the model that John offers us today, for us and for the Church. A Church that is
always at the service of the Word. A Church that never takes anything for herself.
Today in prayer we asked for the grace of joy, we asked the Lord to cheer this Church
in her service to the Word, to be the voice of this Word, preach this Word. We ask
for the grace, the dignity of John, with no ideas of their own, without a Gospel taken
as property, only one Church that indicates the Word, and this even to martyrdom.
So be it! "
Mass was concelebrated by Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi,
and attended by a group of priests and collaborators of the Pontifical Council for
Culture, a group of employees of the Pontifical Commission for Sacred Archaeology
and the Vatican’s Philatelic and Numismatic Office.