Pope in Ireland: Our world needs
a revolution of love
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| Pope Francis greets a couple at Saint mary's Pro-cathedral. - ANSA |
During a meeting with around 350 couples at Saint Mary’s
Pro-Cathedral, in Dublin on Saturday, Pope Francis says “There will be no
revolution of love without a revolution of tenderness”.
By Francesca Merlo
An important part of the programme for Pope Francis’
visit to Ireland for the World Meeting of Families, was the meeting
he himself requested in order to listen to engaged and married couples. During
the question and answer encounter at Dublin’s Saint Mary’s
Pro-Cathedral, the Pope told those present that “our world needs a
revolution of love”. “Let that revolution begin with you and your families”, he
said.
A family tree without roots
Pope Francis stressed the importance of this love, saying
that we must return to and take care of our family roots. “No family can grow
if it forgets its roots”, he said. These roots transmit the generational
experiences that teach us life and love. “Children will not grow in love if
they do not learn how to converse with their grandparents”, Pope Francis said.
Keepers of collective memory
The Pope went on to thank an elderly couple who were there
at Saint Mary’s to present their testimony after recently celebrating their
Golden Wedding anniversary. Pope Francis said the witness of their struggles
and the stories of their experiences are valuable to all young couples, and to
anyone engaged in the long journey that is marriage. The Pope described them as
“keepers of our collective memory” and said their faith-filled witness “is a
precious resource for young couples, who look to the future with excitement and
hope and, perhaps, a touch of trepidation!”.
Parents as teachers
Pope Francis went on to address the questions of two more
couples, one of which regarded transmitting the faith to their children. It is
in the “domestic church”, he replied, that “children learn the meaning of
fidelity, integrity and sacrifice”. “The faith is passed on around the family
table, in ordinary conversation, in the language that persevering love alone
knows how to speak”.
Addressing parents directly, the Pope said “Your children
will learn how to share the goods of the earth with everyone, if they see how
their parents take care of others, who are poorer or less fortunate than
themselves”. Parents, he concluded, will always be their children’s “first
teachers in the faith”.
God’s dream of love
Another question concerned how to show that marriage is a
vocation and not just a simple institution. “Nowadays we are not used to
anything that really lasts for the whole of our lives”, the Pope replied. “The
sacrament of matrimony”, he added, “shares in the mystery of God’s eternal
love”.
Going off script, Pope Francis added that “temporary love
is, in fact, infatuation or puppy love. Love is definitive”, he added: “an ‘I’
and a ‘you’”.
Finally, Pope Francis described love as “God’s dream for us
and for the whole human family”, one that He asks us to make our own. “Please,
never forget this”, said the Pope, “and never stop dreaming!”.
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