Pope Francis in Fatima: greetings at chapel of
apparitions
Pope Fracis arrives at the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Fatima as faithful hold candles Friday, May 12, 2017, in Fatima, Portugal - AP |
(Vatican Radio) Pope Francis greeted pilgrims on Friday
evening in Fatima, as they gathered with him for a brief moment of prayerful
recollection before the great vigil that would begin with the recitation of the
Rosary led by the Holy Father himself. Below, please find the full text of the
Holy Father's prepared remarks, in their official English translation.
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Greeting of His Holiness Pope Francis
Vigil at the Chapel of the Apparitions
12 May 2017
Vigil at the Chapel of the Apparitions
12 May 2017
Dear Pilgrims to Mary and with Mary!
Thank you for your welcome and for joining me on this
pilgrimage of hope and peace. Even now, I want to assure all of you who
are united with me, here or elsewhere, that you have a special place in my
heart. I feel that Jesus has entrusted you to me (cf. Jn 21:15-17),
and I embrace all of you and commend you to Jesus, “especially those most in
need” – as Our Lady taught us to pray (Apparition of July, 1917). May
she, the loving and solicitous Mother of the needy, obtain for them the Lord’s
blessing! On each of the destitute and outcast robbed of the present, on
each of the excluded and abandoned denied a future, on each of the orphans and
victims of injustice refused a past, may there descend the blessing of God,
incarnate in Jesus Christ. “The Lord bless you and keep you. The
Lord make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you. The Lord
lift up his countenance upon you, and give you peace” (Num 6:24-26).
This blessing was fulfilled in the Virgin Mary. No
other creature ever basked in the light of God’s face as did Mary; she in turn
gave a human face to the Son of the eternal Father. Now we can
contemplate her in the succession of joyful, luminous, sorrowful and glorious
moments of her life, which we revisit in our recitation of the rosary. With
Christ and Mary, we abide in God. Indeed, “if we want to be Christian, we
must be Marian; in a word, we have to acknowledge the essential, vital and
providential relationship uniting Our Lady to Jesus, a relationship that opens
before us the way leading to him” (PAUL VI, Address at the Shine of Our
Lady of Bonaria, Cagliari, 24 April 1970). Each time we recite the
rosary, in this holy place or anywhere else, the Gospel enters anew into the
life of individuals, families, peoples and the entire world.
Pilgrims with Mary… But which Mary?
A teacher of the spiritual life, the first to follow Jesus on the
“narrow way” of the cross by giving us an example, or a Lady “unapproachable”
and impossible to imitate? A woman “blessed because she believed” always and
everywhere in God’s words (cf. Lk 1:42.45), or a “plaster
statue” from whom we beg favours at little cost? The Virgin Mary of the
Gospel, venerated by the Church at prayer, or a Mary of our own making: one who
restrains the arm of a vengeful God; one sweeter than Jesus the ruthless judge;
one more merciful than the Lamb slain for us?
Great injustice is done to God’s grace whenever we say that
sins are punished by his judgment, without first saying – as the Gospel clearly
does – that they are forgiven by his mercy! Mercy has to be put before
judgment and, in any case, God’s judgment will always be rendered in the light
of his mercy. Obviously, God’s mercy does not deny justice, for Jesus
took upon himself the consequences of our sin, together with its due
punishment. He did not deny sin, but redeemed it on the cross.
Hence, in the faith that unites us to the cross of Christ, we are freed of our
sins; we put aside all fear and dread, as unbefitting those who are loved (cf. 1
Jn 4:18). “Whenever we look to Mary, we come to believe once
again in the revolutionary nature of love and tenderness. In her, we see
that humility and tenderness are not virtues of the weak but of the strong, who
need not treat others poorly in order to feel important themselves… This
interplay of justice and tenderness, of contemplation and concern for others,
is what makes the ecclesial community look to Mary as a model of
evangelization” (Ap. Exhort. Evangelii Gaudium, 288). With
Mary, may each of us become a sign and sacrament of the mercy of God, who
pardons always and pardons everything.
Hand in hand with the Virgin Mother, and under her watchful
gaze, may we come to sing with joy the mercies of the Lord, and cry out: “My
soul sings to you, Lord!” The mercy you have shown to all your saints and
all your faithful people, you have also shown to me. Out of the pride of
my heart, I went astray, following my own ambitions and interests, without
gaining any crown of glory! My one hope of glory, Lord, is this: that
your Mother will take me in her arms, shelter me beneath her mantle, and set me
close to your heart. Amen.
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