Pope Benedict: address at Etzelsbach Marian Shrine
Friday evening Pope Benedict XVI lead a congregation of hundreds in the celebration
Vespers at the Wallfahrtskapelle, or Pilgrimage Chapel of the Shrine, located
in the small hamlet of Etzelsbach, outside the city of Erfurt.
Below we
publish the text of his discourse:
Dear Brothers and Sisters, Now I
am able to fulfil my wish to visit Eichsfeld, and here in Etzelsbach to thank Mary
in company with you. “Here in the beloved quiet vale”, as the pilgrims’ hymn says,
“under the old lime trees”, Mary gives us security and new strength. During two godless
dictatorships, which sought to deprive the people of their ancestral faith, the inhabitants
of Eichsfeld were in no doubt that here in this shrine at Etzelsbach an open door
and a place of inner peace was to be found. The special friendship with Mary that
grew from all this, is what we seek to cultivate further, not least through this evening’s
Vespers of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
When Christians of all times and places
turn to Mary, they are acting on the spontaneous conviction that Jesus cannot refuse
his mother what she asks; and they are relying on the unshakable trust that Mary is
also our mother – a mother who has experienced the greatest of all sorrows, who feels
all our griefs with us and ponders in a maternal way how to overcome them. How many
people down the centuries have made pilgrimages to Mary, in order to find comfort
and strength before the image of the Mother of Sorrows, as here at Etzelsbach!
Let
us look upon her likeness: a woman of middle age, her eyelids heavy with much weeping,
gazing pensively into the distance, as if meditating in her heart upon everything
that had happened. On her knees rests the lifeless body of her son, she holds him
gently and lovingly, like a precious gift. We see the marks of the crucifixion on
his bare flesh. The left arm of the corpse is pointing straight down. Perhaps this
sculpture of the Pietà, like so many others, was originally placed above an altar.
The crucified Jesus would then be pointing with his outstretched arm to what was taking
place on the altar, where the holy sacrifice that he had accomplished is made present
in the Eucharist.
A particular feature of the holy image of Etzelsbach is the
position of Our Lord’s body. In most representations of the Pietà, the dead Jesus
is lying with his head facing left, so that the observer can see the wounded side
of the Crucified Lord. Here in Etzelsbach, however, the wounded side is concealed,
because the body is facing the other way. It seems to me that a deep meaning lies
hidden in this representation, that only becomes apparent through silent contemplation:
in the Etzelsbach image, the hearts of Jesus and his mother are turned to one another;
they come close to each other. They exchange their love. We know that the heart
is also the seat of the most tender affection as well as the most intimate compassion.
In Mary’s heart there is room for the love that her divine Son wants to bestow upon
the world.
Marian devotion focuses on contemplation of the relationship between
the Mother and her divine Son. The faithful constantly discover new dimensions and
qualities which this mystery can help to disclose for us, for example when the image
of the Immaculate Heart of Mary is seen as a symbol of her deep and unreserved loving
unity with Christ. It is not self-fulfilment that truly enables people to flourish,
according to the model that modern life so often proposes to us, which can easily
turn into a sophisticated form of selfishness. Rather it is an attitude of self-giving
directed towards the heart of Mary and hence also towards the heart of the Redeemer.
“We
know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called
according to his purpose” (Rom 8:28), as we have just heard in the Scripture reading.
With Mary, God has worked for good in everything, and he does not cease, through Mary,
to cause good to spread further in the world. Looking down from the Cross, from the
throne of grace and salvation, Jesus gave us his mother Mary to be our mother. At
the moment of his self-offering for mankind, he makes Mary as it were the channel
of the rivers of grace that flow from the Cross. At the foot of the Cross, Mary becomes
our fellow traveller and protector on life’s journey. “By her motherly love she cares
for her son’s sisters and brothers who still journey on earth surrounded by dangers
and difficulties, until they are led into their blessed home” (Lumen Gentium, 62).
Yes indeed, in life we pass through high-points and low-points, but Mary intercedes
for us with her Son and conveys to us the strength of divine love.
Our trust
in the powerful intercession of the Mother of God and our gratitude for the help we
have repeatedly experienced impel us, as it were, to think beyond the needs of the
moment. What does Mary actually want to say to us, when she rescues us from our plight?
She wants to help us grasp the breadth and depth of our Christian vocation. With
a mother’s tenderness, she wants to make us understand that our whole life should
be a response to the love of our God, who is so rich in mercy. “Understand,” she
seems to say to us, “that God, who is the source of all that is good and who never
desires anything other than your true happiness, has the right to demand of you a
life that yields unreservedly and joyfully to his will, striving at the same time
that others may do likewise.” Where God is, there is a future. Indeed – when we
allow God’s love to influence the whole of our lives, then heaven stands open. Then
it is possible so to shape the present that it corresponds more and more to the Good
News of our Lord Jesus Christ. Then the little things of everyday life acquire meaning,
and great problems find solutions. Amen.