Pope at Mass prays for government
leaders taking care of their people during Covid-19
Pope Francis began Mass on Saturday praying that the Lord
might help and give strength to government leaders at all levels, and reflected
on how to live through moments of crisis.
By Sr Bernadette Mary Reis, fsp
Pope Francis prayed for government leaders, heads of state,
legislators, mayors, heads of regions on Saturday morning during Mass at the
Casa Santa Marta. He prayed that the “Lord might help them and grant them
strength because their work is not easy. When there are differences among
them”, he prayed, “may they understand that in moments of crisis they must be
very united for the good of their people because unity is superior to
conflict”.
The First Reading and the Gospel provided the Holy Father
the theme for his homily. He reflected on the fact that the Church, as well as
all of us, live both moments of peace in our lives and moments of crisis. The
First Reading (9:31-42) says that the early Church was at peace. The Gospel of
John presents a moment of crisis when many disciples decided to follow Jesus no
longer (6:31-42).
The Church was at peace
Pope Francis began his homily citing the First Reading. “The
Church…was at peace. She was being built up and walked in the fear of the Lord,
and with the consolation of the Holy Spirit she grew in numbers”. This
description tells us that the Church at that moment was serene, experiencing
consolation, the Pope said.
Crisis is inevitable
The Pope went on saying that life is filled not only with
moments of peace but also moments of crisis. Today the Gospel recounts the
reaction of many of Jesus’s disciples to a teaching they found difficult to
digest. Jesus had revealed that those who would eat His flesh and blood would
have eternal life.
Moment of choice
Critical moments such as these are moments when we are
required to make a choice, Pope Francis said. It is precisely at this moment
that He requires the Twelve to choose if they too want to leave Him. This
prompts Peter’s second confession of faith: “Lord, to whom shall we go? You
have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and are convinced that
you are the Holy One of God”. “Peter does not understand” everything that Jesus
is saying, the Pope continued. “But he trusts the Lord”.
How to live through crisis
Pope Francis quoted a proverb used in Argentina to explain
how to live through moments of crisis in the faith. “When you go on horseback
and you have to cross a river, don’t change horses in the middle of the river”.
Those who decided to leave Jesus, the Pope said, changed horses midstream.
Instead, moments of crisis require that we persevere, remain silent, stay
grounded in our convictions. “It is not the moment to make changes”, Pope
Francis continued. It is the moment to remain faithful. It is the moment when
God is faithful, he said. A moment of crisis is a call to conversion in which
remaining faithful “may inspire changes for the better, but not to distance
ourselves from the good”.
Managing peace and crisis
“We Christians need to learn how to manage both moments of
peace and moments of crisis”, Pope Francis explained. Crises in the faith have
been described by spiritual writers as “going through fire in order to become
strong”, he said. His prayer to the Lord was that the Lord might send His Holy
Spirit so that we might know “how to resist temptations in moment of crisis,
that we might know how to be faithful…with the hope” that moments of peace will
follow. “May the Lord grant us the strength in moments of crisis not to sell
out the faith”.
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