Pope Francis: 'Salvation is not for sale'
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis has urged
Christians not to lose the capacity to feel loved.
Speaking during the homily on Tuesday morning at the Casa
Santa Marta, the Pope said that while it is possible to recuperate a lost
capacity to love, if one no longer has the capacity feel loved, all is lost.
Pope Francis reflected on the reading from the Gospel of
Luke in which Jesus says “Blessed are those who will take food in the Kingdom
of God” and explained that the Lord asks us to open our doors to those who
cannot reciprocate.
The parable of the man who gave a dinner to which he
invited many
The parable tells of a man who gave a great dinner to which he invited many. But when the time for the dinner came, those who had been invited declined the invitation because they were taken by their own interests which seemed to them more important than the invitation itself.
The parable tells of a man who gave a great dinner to which he invited many. But when the time for the dinner came, those who had been invited declined the invitation because they were taken by their own interests which seemed to them more important than the invitation itself.
They were asking themselves – the Pope noted – what benefit
they could get out of the dinner, just like that man who stores up treasure for
himself but is not rich in what matters to God.
They were so concerned with their own interests the Pope
said they were “incapable of understanding the gratuity of the
invitation”.
Salvation is not for sale
And warning the faithful against this kind of attitude the Pope
said: “if you do not understand the gratuity of God's invitation, you do not
understand anything”.
He explained that the only price God asks one to pay is that
of being needy, in body and in soul: one must be in need of love.
He remarked on the two different attitudes: on the one hand the Lord who asks for nothing in return and tells the servant to invite the poor, the crippled, the good and the bad: “this gratuitousness has no limits, God receives all”.
He remarked on the two different attitudes: on the one hand the Lord who asks for nothing in return and tells the servant to invite the poor, the crippled, the good and the bad: “this gratuitousness has no limits, God receives all”.
On the other hand, he said, the attitude of those who had
been invited but who did not understand, like the elder brother of Prodigal son
who does not want to attend the banquet arranged by his father because “he does
not understand”.
“He spent all his money, he wasted his inheritance in vices
and sins, and you celebrate his homecoming? I am a practicing Catholic, I go to
Mass every Sunday and carry out my duties and you do nothing for me? He does
not understand the gratuity of salvation” he said.
Salvation, the Pope reiterated, is free: “It is God’s gift
to which one responds with another gift, the gift of one’s heart.”
God asks only for love and fidelity
The Lord, he said does not ask for anything in return, only
love and fidelity. Salvation is not for sale, one simply has to accept the
invitation to His banquet, thus: “Blessed are those who will take food in the
Kingdom of God” – This is Salvation.
Those, he continued, who do not want to take part in the
banquet have lost the capacity to feel that they are loved.
“When one loses – not the capacity to love because that is
something that can be recuperated – but the capacity to feel loved there is no
hope and all is lost” he said.
It reminds us, Pope Francis concluded, of the writing on the
gate to Dante’s inferno ‘Abandon hope all ye who enter here’ - we must think of
this and of the Lord who wants His home to be filled: “Let us ask the Lord to
save us from losing the ability to feel loved”.
Không có nhận xét nào:
Đăng nhận xét