Cardinal Turkson ends Japan visit

August 09, 2013 - True peace and happiness is obtained with the attitude of the “contrite of heart and humble of spirit” together with discipleship of Jesus. The remark was made by Cardinal Peter Turkson, the president of the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, who on Friday concluded a 5-day visit to Japan, to participate in the “Ten Days for Peace” initiative by Japanese dioceses to commemorate the 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. “Gathered, then, in these parts of Japan in these past ten days, to celebrate the yearning of human hearts for peace and happiness, let us recall that true peace and happiness are gifts of God which have been promised to us…,” the cardinal said in his homily at a Mass in Nagasaki on the August 9^th anniversary of the bombing of the city. “Let us also ceaselessly seek peace in prayer, and assiduously work for it in laboratories of love, in imitation of Him, in whose love is our peace,” he urged. Commenting on the scripture readings, the Ghanian prelate said that God’s pardon and forgiveness are freely bestowed on a contrite and humble heart, which brings healing, comfort and peace. In the Beatitudes, he explained, Jesus teaches that true blessedness lies in the opposites to the popularly recognized forms and goals of happiness. Jesus, the cardinal said, gives peace not as the world gives, but to the contrite and humble of heart.