Pope ushers in Holy Week

(March 17, 2008) Pope Benedict XVI on Sunday ushered the world’s Catholics into Christianity’s holiest week with a solemn Palm Sunday liturgy, calling on the faithful to examine whether worldly desires and idols had corrupted their faith. The open-air Mass in St. Peter’s Square commemorated Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem when crowds welcomed him waving palm fronds and olive branches. Palm Sunday initiates the Holy Week that culminates into Easter, Christians’ most solemn feast that Christ’s triumphant resurrection, following his passion and death on the Cross. Speaking to thousands holding olive branches and palm fronds, the Pope urged Catholics to shun greed and selfish egoism. The Holy Father centered his homily on the Gospel passage of Christ cleansing the temple of money changers and merchants, who had transformed the house of his father into a den of thieves, reminding all of the greed that must be rooted out. "Does the awareness that greed that is idolatry also reach our heart and our life practices?” he asked. “Do we not perhaps also allow idols to enter even into the world of our faith? Are we disposed to let the Lord purify us again and again, allowing him to chase out of us and the Church what is contrary to him?"
At the end of the Mass, Pope Benedict made an emotional appeal for an end to violence in Iraq, recalling the death of kidnapped Catholic Chaldean Archbishop Paulos Faraj Raho of Mosul, whose body was found last Thursday in the northern city. Before reciting the midday ‘Angelus’ Marian prayer the Pope paid tribute to the memory of the 65-year old prelate saying, “"His beautiful witness of fidelity to Christ, to the Church and his people, whom he did not want to abandon despite numerous threats, moves me to cry out forcefully and with distress: Enough with the bloodshed, enough with the violence, enough with the hatred in Iraq!" The Holy Father went on to plea for an end to the upheaval caused by the war in Iraq, which began five years ago this week. He called on Iraqis to lift up their heads and be the first among those to rebuild their national life. He also called for reconciliation, forgiveness, justice and respect for the civil coexistence of tribes, ethnic groups and religious groups.
Palm Sunday is also marked as World Youth Day at the diocesan level and Benedict XVI urged prayers for young people, so that this summer's World Youth Day in Sydney, Australia, might be a time of "deep and lasting spiritual renewal." Listen to the Pope speak in English: