Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati: A Saint for Today

 

Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati (1901-1925) has been a significant global patron for youth and young adults. St. John Paul II declared him a patron for World Youth Days and deemed him "the man of the beatitudes" as he exemplified those blessings in his everyday life. Pope Francis listed him among the twelve exemplary saints for all young people in his apostolic exhortation, Christus Vivit, "who devoted their lives to Christ... precious reflections of the young Christ; their radiant witness encourages us and awakens us from our lethargy." (CV 49) Frassati was considered extraordinary in his "ordinariness." Pier Giorgio was engaged in the life of the Church through regular worship and adoration, service to the poor and marginalized, advocacy for social justice for the disenfranchised and for religious liberty, regular participation in student activities, devotion to his family, and joyful companionship with his friends and fellow Catholics in his community. He saw many parallels between Catholic life and his favorite pastime, mountain-climbing. He would regularly organize trips into the mountains with his close friends with occasions for prayer, liturgies, and conversations about faith on the way up to or down from the summit. After what would become his final climb he wrote a simple note on a photograph: "Verso L'Alto", which means "to the heights." This phrase has since come to encapsulate his philosophy of mountaineering and his Catholic outlook on life and adventure. 

You can learn more about Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati at Frassati USA.

Pope Francis to Youth: God prefers us weak

(CNA/EWTN News) The weaker we are, the more God's mercy can transform our lives. Pope Francis made these impromptu remarks on Saturday to crowds of young people gathered outside of Krakow’s St. John Paul II shrine.

“Today, the Lord wants us to feel ever more profoundly his great mercy,” the Pope said in a short, impromptu speech, delivered right after his visit to the Polish city’s Divine Mercy shrine. “May we never turn away from Jesus!”

Pope Francis shared these thoughts to a group of young people who are in Poland for World Youth Day moments before entering the St. John Paul II shrine to pass through its Holy Door, hear confessions, and celebrate Mass for priests and religious men and women. 

We may think that we are the “worst” on account of our sins and weaknesses, the Pope told the youth. However, this is how God prefers us to be, in order that “his mercy may spread.”

“Let us take advantage of these days to receive all of the mercy of Jesus!”

Pope Francis proceeded to lead the young people in praying the Hail Mary before bestowing on them his blessing.

“And please, I ask you to pray for me.”

Before his brief encounter with the young people, the pontiff paid a visit to the shrine of the Divine Mercy where the body of St. Faustina Kowalska are interred.

There, he venerated the relics of the Polish saint and mystic, during a brief ceremony attended by some 300 people, including members of the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy, St. Faustina’s own order.

While there, Pope Francis signed the sanctuary’s guestbook with the words: “I desire mercy, and not sacrifices.” The words refer to a passage from the Gospel of Matthew which the Pope has often referred to in the past.

Venerated by the Church as the “Apostle of Divine Mercy,” St. Faustina (1905-1938) reported numerous visions of Jesus throughout her life which she recorded in her diary. Many of the devotions relating to the feast of Divine Mercy, established on the first Sunday of Easter by St. John Paul II, were inspired by her writings.

Saturday marks the second to last day of Pope Francis’ July 27-31 apostolic journey to Poland where he is leading World Youth Day celebrations.

Jesus Christ, You Are My Life

Pope Francis, World Youth Day and Divine Mercy

(CNA/EWTN News).- With World Youth Day coming up next year, Pope Francis has a question for young people: “Do you realize how precious you are to God, who has given you everything out of love?”

“You, dear young man, dear young woman, have you ever felt the gaze of everlasting love upon you, a gaze that looks beyond your sins, limitations and failings, and continues to have faith in you and to look upon your life with hope?” the Pope asked Sept. 28.

His Message for the 31st World Youth Day in Krakow 2016 invited young people to reflect on mercy and to visit the Divine Mercy Shrine in Krakow. The next global Catholic youth gathering takes place July 25-31.

“Dear young people, at the Shrine in Krakow dedicated to the merciful Jesus, where he is depicted in the image venerated by the people of God, Jesus is waiting for you. He has confidence in you and is counting on you! He has so many things to say to each of you,” the Pope continued.

“Do not be afraid to look into his eyes, full of infinite love for you. Open yourselves to his merciful gaze, so ready to forgive all your sins. A look from him can change your lives and heal the wounds of your souls. His eyes can quench the thirst that dwells deep in your young hearts, a thirst for love, for peace, for joy and for true happiness. Come to him and do not be afraid!”

Pope Francis credited to Divine Providence the decision to celebrate World Youth Day in Krakow, the city of Sts. John Paul II and Faustina Kowalska. St. Faustina, a 20th century nun, had visions of Christ, upon which is based the Chaplet of Divine Mercy.

“John Paul II realized that this is the time of mercy,” Pope Francis said. He noted that his predecessor had instituted the Feast of Divine Mercy and personally inaugurated Krakow’s Divine Mercy Shrine in 2002.

Read the rest here.

WYD Denver 1993: Launching pad for the new evangelization

The following comes from Chris Stefanick:

It’s been 20 years since World Youth Day 1993. It’s no accident that Blessed John Paul II chose Denver for the event. Archbishop Charles Chaput remembers being on the committee that made recommendations to the Holy See about which city should host the event.

“The vote in that group of bishops went to Minneapolis/St.Paul because of the large number of Catholics there, because they were experienced at having major events,” he said. “Nonetheless, the Holy Father chose Denver.”

I think that’s because World Youth Day was never just about the attendees, but about the world he intended to unleash them on. Like Jesus, who loved preaching with the sea as his backdrop—an image of eternity that, unlike the sky, is accessible to man—John Paul II loved to pick key locations that would help him convey his message. He often made reference to the symbolic meaning of where he was while preaching. And multiple times during his presentations at World Youth day ‘93, the Holy Father referenced “the modern metropolis.”

Denver is a thoroughly New World city—not just historically but spiritually. As strong as the Church is in Denver, by no means is it a Catholic city. Catholics only represent 16.4 percent of the population. Nor is Colorado known as a pro-life state. It was the first U.S. state to legalize abortion. Nor was it a “safe” city at the time. World Youth Day coincided with a terrifying wave of gang violence in the city that took the lives of innocent bystanders. The “culture of death” John Paul II described was alive and well in Denver.

Think of the audacity of the Holy Father, to bring a Catholic event for youth here—in the hope of drawing hundreds of thousands of attendees! What he saw in Denver that few others saw, was the perfect launching pad for the “new evangelization,” which he constantly spoke of—that is, a renewed proclamation of the Gospel to a world that’s already heard of it (as opposed to non-Christian cultures), using all the energy, creativity and means of modern communication at our disposal.

The late Bishop Roger Kaffer, who was an auxiliary bishop in Joliet, Ill., privately relayed a conversation to me that he’d had with John Paul II about the connection of World Youth Day and the new evangelization.

Bishop Kaffer: “I’m talking about your upcoming visit to Denver at every confirmation. Is there something I can tell the youth that ‘the pope told me to tell you’?”

JPII: “I wrote you a letter!” the pope shot back, referring to his 1985 Apostolic Letter to the Youth of the World.

Bishop Kaffer: “I know. I read it. But I want something live from you.”

JPII: “Yes. Last year (1992) I went to the Dominican Republic to inaugurate the 500th anniversary of the evangelization of the Americas. I consider my coming to Denver (for World Youth Day ’93) to be the close of that jubilee year and the beginning of the new evangelization of the Americas and of the world, and I’m counting on youth to help.”

And help they did!

I wonder how many reporters had to trash the stories they prepared for the event with headlines like “Catholicism proves its irrelevance with dismal turnout for World Youth Day in Denver.” Or perhaps, “Young people show up in droves to protest antiquated Church.” Or worse, “Young people caught in the crossfire of gang violence.” Instead, 750,000 teens showed up. I guess they hadn’t gotten the memo that Catholicism doesn’t speak to young people. As for Denver’s violence, all crime in the city came to a grinding halt during the event. It’s hard to count the number of people I’ve met whose lives were changed, who discovered a vocation, or birthed a new apostolic initiative because of that World Youth Day.

Anti-Catholic reporters were probably as dumbfounded as the devil was on the first Easter Sunday. Wherever they’re hosted, World Youth Days tend to be among the largest gatherings in a nation’s history, if not the largest. Denver was no exception. (I’ve often heard World Youth Day referred to as “the Catholic Woodstock.” For the record, World Youth day tends to outnumber Woodstock by anywhere from a half-million to 5 million young people. I think it’s more proper to call Woodstock “the secular World Youth Day!”)

I’ll never forget the pope’s words, standing in Cherry Creek State Park as a teenager, as he made it clear that World Youth Day, like all the graces God gives, wasn’t just about us. It was about God sending us to light up the world.

“Young pilgrims, Christ needs you to enlighten the world and to show it the ‘path to life.’”… At this stage of history, the liberating message of the Gospel of life has been put into your hands. And the mission of proclaiming it to the ends of the earth is now passing to your generation. … Do not be afraid to go out on the streets and into public places, like the first apostles who preached Christ and the good news of salvation in the squares of cities, towns and villages. This is no time to be ashamed of the Gospel (see Rom 1:16). … Do not be afraid to break out of comfortable and routine modes of living, in order to take up the challenge of making Christ known in the modern ‘metropolis.’ It is you who must ‘go out’ …”

In a world that tends to set the bar for young people so low, the confidence the Holy Father had in us to carry on the new evangelization was life-changing. It reminds me of the confidence our Lord placed in the apostles, putting the Church in their very “under-qualified” hands! God always sees more in us than we see in ourselves, doesn’t he?

Twenty years later, it’s time to give thanks for the grace of World Youth Day ‘93, and to re-commit to the great commission Blessed John Paul II handed on to our generation. When it comes to the new evangelization, nothing less than the future of civilization and the eternal destiny of countless lives hinges on our success.

Blessed John Paul II, pray for us.

Denver 1993: Launching pad for the new evangelization

World Youth Day in Denver: Twenty Years Ago

The following comes from Sister Mary Ann Walsh:
Twenty years ago this August Denver hosted World Youth Day, the first time the world event took place in the U.S. As WYD director of communications, I was on a core team from Washington with Father Dennis Schnurr, WYD executive director and now archbishop of Cincinnati, and Paul Henderson, WYD director of programming and now director of planning and communication operations at the USCCB. We’ve remained friends, with the kind of friendship borne of going to war together. 

When I speak about WYD, I compare it to an elephant, one you gently prod to move where you’d like it to go, but knowing at any moment it could overpower you. If we knew how big WYD would become, we would have been afraid. With blissful ignorance, we set off for a fun adventure. 

Though founded in Rome in 1985, WYD hadn’t quite caught on. The Vatican thought that holding the event in the USA would establish it. They counted on the immense media presence and U.S. ingenuity and organization. Their confidence was well placed. 

As a reporter in Rome, I had traveled with Pope John Paul II. But sitting on a plane with him was a far cry from organizing media for an event to draw about 2,000 journalists and setting up a structure for TV and radio coverage. Early on, I took my concerns to Tim Russert, enthusiastic Catholic and host of NBC’s Meet the Press. With an analysis reflective of a man used to working within walls of power, he explained how to work with the media. “You own the pope, so you’re in charge,” he said. 

Now if you want to be empowered, convince yourself you own the pope. When TV producers would balk at our plans, I would remain calm because, as Russert had assured me, I owned the pope. Russert also offered the help of veteran NBC special events producer Bob Asman, who had just organized the TV pool coverage of the Democratic National Convention in New York City. “We’ll call him the ‘secret missionary for God,’” Russert laughed. Asman so impressed the TV stations in Denver that had formed a consortium to deal with the largest event they’d ever known, that they hired him almost as soon as they met him. 

When Catholic youth heard about WYD, they responded in force and surprised the bishops. Youth begged to go to the church event instead of church leaders begging them to go. Bishops who traveled with them found it life changing. It was a booster shot for the shepherds to be surrounded by energetic sheep. Their enthusiasm caught reporters up short. Media geared up for protests, but they never materialized. When one reporter asked a girl about her feelings on birth control and abortion, she told him teen-style, “Get a life!” The days were for prayer, not protest. The Washington Post reported the event was like Woodstock, with all of the good and none of the bad of the 1969 rock concert at a farm in the Catskills. 

When I returned home, I had WYD on my mind. I must have overdone it because a friend told me one evening as we went down to Washington’s Union Station that all I talked about was World Youth Day. “I’m sure it was wonderful for you,” she said, “but let it go.” When we got to the station, a teenager bounded toward me across the Main Hall. “Hey, Sister Mary Ann,” he shouted. “Remember me? We met at World Youth Day. It was great.” My friend laughed, “Case closed,” she said, “I guess it was an event to last a lifetime.” 

The Pope of Mercy

The following comes from John Allen at NCR:

In most respects, Alitalia flight 4001 from Rio de Janeiro to Rome on Sunday night was nothing to write home about. The seats in economy class were fairly uncomfortable, and the food was merely adequate. The main course was a lukewarm square of lasagna roughly the size of a Ritz cracker.

I'll say this for it, however: The in-flight entertainment was spectacular.

As is by now well-known, we were treated to a pope standing in the press compartment for an hour and 20 minutes, taking questions on every topic under the sun with no filters and no limits, speaking without notes and delivering straight answers. Among other things, one had to be awed by the energy of the 76-year-old pontiff, who had just finished a grueling seven-day trip to Brazil yet seemed capable of going on almost indefinitely.

As I said Monday on CNN with Michael Holmes, when you cover the Vatican, you sometimes sit around late at night dreaming of moments like this, but you never really think you'll live to see them happen.

While the headline was the pope's comments on gays -- "Who am I to judge?" -- it was a sprawling conversation, with the full transcript extending to almost 10,000 words. It's dangerous with such a wide range of topics to try to reduce the pope's message to a single word, but in this case, I believe it can be done without leaving anything essential out of view.

The one-word interpretive key to Francis' news conference and arguably to his entire papacy to date: "mercy."

As I've written before, each recent pope has had a catchphrase that represents his core emphasis. For John Paul II, it was "Be not afraid!", a call to revive the church's missionary swagger after a period of introspection and self-doubt. For Benedict, it was "reason and faith," the argument that religion shorn of self-critical reflection becomes extremism while human reason without the orientation of ultimate truths becomes skepticism and nihilism.

For Francis, his signature idea is mercy. Over and over again, he emphasizes God's endless capacity to forgive, insisting what the world needs to hear from the church above all today is a message of compassion.

Sorting through all the comments Francis made during the on-board news conference, probably the single most revealing came in response to a question about divorced and remarried Catholics. We'll come to the specifics on that issue another time, but it was the preface to his answer that provides the best window into his pastoral philosophy.

Here's what he said, word for word, translated from Italian.

"Mercy is a larger theme than the question you raise [divorced and remarried Catholics]. I believe this is the time of mercy. This change of epoch, also because of many problems of the church -- such as the example of some priests who aren't good, also the problems of corruption in the church -- and also the problem of clericalism, for example, has left many wounds, many wounds. The church is a mother: It must reach out to heal the wounds, yes? With mercy. If the Lord never tires of forgiving, we don't have any other path than this one: before anything else, curing the wounds, yes? It's a mother, the church, and it must go down this path of mercy. It must find mercy for everyone, no? I think about how when the Prodigal Son returned home, his father didn't say: 'But you, listen, sit down. What did you do with the money?' No, he held a party. Then, maybe, when the son wanted to talk, he talked. The church must do the same. When there's someone ... but, it's not enough to wait for them: We must go and seek them. This is mercy. And I believe that is a kairos: This time is akairos of mercy. John Paul II had this intuition first, when he began with Faustina Kowalska, the Divine Mercy ... he had something, he intuited that it was a necessity of this time."

Kairos is a deeply evocative Gospel term that means an appointed moment in the plan of God, as in Mark 1:15: "This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand." The Greek term for "time" in that passage is kairos. In the Christian imagination, the term kairos conjures up a special moment in history when a particular aspect of God's plan for salvation is unfolding.

Francis' emphasis on mercy is nearly ubiquitous. In a recent essay for the Italian newspaperCorriere della Sera, Enzo Bianchi, founder of the celebrated ecumenical monastery of Bose, offered a statistical analysis of the words used most frequently by Francis since his election. He found that the single most commonly used term was "joy," more than a hundred times, followed closely by "mercy," which the pope has used almost a hundred times.

This conviction that we are living in a kairos of mercy makes sense of everything else the pope said on the plane and, for that matter, most of what he's said and done since his election in March.

It explains his unwillingness to pass judgment on gays, and it also explains his refusal to be drawn into a political diatribe when a Brazilian journalist asked him about recent laws in the country liberalizing abortion and permitting same-sex marriage. Asked why he didn't address those issues during his trip, the pope said, "It wasn't necessary to speak of them, but of the positive things that get young people going. Anyway, young people know perfectly well what the position of the church is."

Pressed for his personal conviction, Francis didn't duck: "That of the church. ... I'm a son of the church."

There you have it in a nutshell. Francis is no doctrinal radical, and there will likely be no substantive upheaval of the church's positions on issues of gender and sex or anything else. On the one specific question Francis fielded along these lines, women's ordination, he reaffirmed "that door is closed."

The revolution under Francis is not one of content, but of tone. He believes it's time for the church to lift up its merciful face to the world, in part because of its own self-inflicted wounds and in part because of the harsh and unforgiving temper of the times. This is a pope who will look for every chance to express compassion, steering clear of finger-wagging unless it's absolutely necessary.

His focus on mercy also helps explain why the sacrament of confession is so important to him, why he made a point of hearing confessions before Mass during his first visit to a Roman parish May 31, something John Paul II and Benedict didn't do. As I wrote July 26, it's quite possible that when he went to Rio de Janeiro's Boa Vista Park to hear five confessions that morning, in his own mind, it was the most important thing he did all week.

The importance of mercy is also expressed in the motto Francis took as pope: Miserando atque eligendo, which means, roughly, "by having mercy and by choosing."

In the popular press, Francis has been dubbed "The Pope of the Poor" and "The People's Pope," and both capture something essential. If you want a formula that most clearly expresses the beating heart of Francis' papacy, however, the best candidate is probably "The Pope of Mercy."

Pope calls on young people to counter daily vanity of consumer society

Rome (AsiaNews)  "Confronting daily vanities, the poison of the void that creeps into our society based on profit and possession, that deceives young people with consumerism." This is the challenge facing the young people who filled the World Day of Rio de Janeiro with enthusiasm, for whom Pope Francis asks us to pray, so that the WYD is not "a flash in the pan" and "so they can translate this experience into their daily journey, into their every day conduct, and also translate into major life choices, responding to the Lord's personal call".

An Angelus the Pope dedicated to that "Sunday" in the city of Rio. There were maybe 30 thousand people in the square, "I thank you for your presence, despite the heat," the Pope tells them adding, "but there are so many young people in the square, it seems like Rio de Janeiro"

"Last Sunday - says Francis- I was in Rio de Janeiro. It was the concluding Mass and the end of the World Youth Day. Together I think we all thank God for the great gift that was this event was, for Brazil, for Latin America and the entire world. It was a new stage in the pilgrimage of young people across continents with the Cross of Christ. We must never forget that the World Youth Days are not 'a flash in the pan', moments of enthusiasm, an ends within themselves, they are stages of a long journey, which began in 1985, on the initiative of Pope John Paul II. Trusting young people the Cross he said: Go, and I will come with you! And so it was, and this pilgrimage of young people has continued with Pope Benedict, and I thank God I was able to experience this wonderful event in Brazil. Always remember: young people do not follow the Pope, they follow Jesus Christ carrying His cross. And the Pope will guide them accompanying them on this journey of faith and hope. "

"I thank so all the young people who participated, even at the cost of sacrifices. And I thank the Lord for the other meetings I had with the pastors and the people of that great country that is Brazil, as well as authorities and volunteers. Brazilians are great people, good people. May the Lord reward all those who have worked for this great celebration of faith. I would like to ask you to pray with me for this intention: that young people who participated in the World Youth Day can translate this experience into their daily journey, into their every day conduct, and they can also translate into major life choices, responding to the Lord's personal call. "

"Today in the liturgy resoundswith the word provocative of Qoheleth:" Vanity of vanities ... all is vanity "(1:2). Young people are particularly sensitive to the void of meaning and values ​​that often surrounds them. And unfortunately they are paying the consequences. Instead, an encounter with the living Jesus, in His great family which is the Church, fills their heart with joy, because it fills them with real life, a deep well that does not run dry and does not rot: we have seen this on the faces of the young people in Rio. But this experience has to confront daily vanities, the poison of void that creeps into our society based on profit and possession that deceives young people with consumerism. The Gospel this Sunday reminds us of the absurdity of basing our happiness on possession. The rich man says to himself: My soul, you have stored up many goods ... rest, eat, drink, be merry!"' But God said to him, 'You fool, this night your life will be demanded of you; and the things you have prepared, to whom will they belong?' (cf. Lk 12.19 to 20.) True wealth is love of God, shared with others. Who experiences this does not fear death, and receives peace of heart. I entrust this intention to the intercession of the Virgin Mary. "

After the Marian prayer, the Pope Francis had "a special memory for the priests and for all the priests of the world, because today is the feast of their patron saint: St. John Mary Vianney. Dear brothers, may we be united in prayer and pastoral charity". "I would also like - he concluded - to remember the liturgical feast of the Transfiguration, wich will be tomorrow, with a thought of deep gratitude to the Venerable Pope Paul VI, who departed from this world on the evening of 6 August, 35 years ago."

Matt Maher sings "Lord, I Need You" during WYD's Eucharistic Adoration

Fr. Robert Barron on Pope Francis and World Youth Day

Hat tip to Fr. Tom Provenzano at The Ax!

Missionary Pope: Francis in Brazil

A Pope who likes to shake things up

The following comes from John Thavis:

What to make of a pope who tells young Catholics to go back to their dioceses and “make a mess!”

Or, allowing for ambiguity in translation, “stir up trouble!” or “shake things up!”

However the words were rendered into English, one thing was clear: Pope Francis believes that the old ways of the church are not enough in today’s world, that it needs new approaches, a shake-up – which of course is what the pope is trying to do at the Vatican, as well.

Here’s how the Vatican officially translated the pope’s remarks, delivered off-the-cuff to Argentinian pilgrims at World Youth Day in Brazil:

“I want you to make yourselves heard in your dioceses, I want the noise to go out, I want the church to go out onto the streets, I want us to resist everything worldly, everything static, everything comfortable, everything to do with clericalism, everything that might make us closed in on ourselves. The parishes, the schools, the institutions are made for going out ... if they don’t, they become an NGO, and the church cannot be an NGO. May the bishops and priests forgive me if some of you create a bit of confusion afterward. That’s my advice. Thanks for whatever you can do.”

That’s a radical message from a pope, and yet it was perfectly in line with Francis’ effort to move the church out of the sacristy and into the street, away from theological debates and toward real-life encounters with the suffering and marginalized.

Throughout his seven days in Brazil, the pope tried to do just that. He lunched with young people and heard their confessions, prayed with inmates and visited recovering drug addicts, embraced the sick at a local hospital, chatted with a poor family in a Rio de Janeiro slum and challenged the world’s powerful to end social and economic inequality.

The pope communicated solidarity in small ways that caught people’s attention, too: asking trash pickers to join him on the papal platform for the Stations of the Cross, for example, or arriving in a simple grey sedan instead of an armored limousine.

His meetings and gestures humanized the church’s social teaching, making it less abstract. In one pastoral setting after another, the pope himself came across more as a figure from the Gospel than an official from Rome.

For those and other reasons, Pope Francis can look at his first foreign trip as a success on many fronts.

-- He critiqued what he called a “culture of selfishness and individualism,” saying that an economic model based on material gain has been unable to feed the hungry or make people truly happy. That’s a message that seemed to resonate with young people, especially when the pope took aim at the corruption and economic injustice that’s helped spawn recent protests in Brazil.

-- The pope implicitly addressed the challenge raised by Pentecostal and evangelical communities, which have attracted many Brazilian Catholics over the last 30 years. He did so primarily by showing attention to spiritual needs of the suffering – the kind of attention many say they have not found in the Catholic Church.

On another level, Francis’ insistence on the Gospel of the poor stood in marked contrast with the “prosperity theology” espoused by some Brazilian Christian preachers.

And while he spoke of an “exodus” of Catholics in recent decades, the pope made clear that his evangelization strategy is not so much about restoring the Catholic Church’s numbers, but revitalizing its energy throughout Latin America and the world. As he told young people at the closing Mass, “The church needs you, your enthusiasm, your creativity and the joy that is so characteristic of you.”

-- He gave some strong marching orders to Catholic ministers and pastoral workers, telling them to promote a “culture of encounter” with those outside the church: “We cannot keep ourselves shut up in parishes, in our communities, when so many people are waiting for the Gospel! It is not enough simply to open the door in welcome, but we must go out through that door to seek and meet the people!”

And taking a page from his own playbook, the pope encouraged ministers to reject intellectualism and speak the language of simplicity. He spelled it out bluntly: “At times we lose people because they don’t understand what we are saying.”

-- Francis connected with the young – but reminded them to keep in mind the elderly. It was clear that the pope sees young people in the church as part of a larger community, not as an isolated subset that needs a special “marketing” approach by the hierarchy.

He emphasized that young people need to appreciate the experience and wisdom of elders, who are often forgotten by society. In this way, he introduced a new theme into World Youth Day: that the young and the old are sometimes victims of our modern economy, which treats both categories as disposable. "We do the elderly an injustice. We set them aside as if they had nothing to offer us," he said.

-- In his speeches, the pope had little or nothing to say about hot button issues like abortion, birth control, gay marriage or sexual permissiveness. But at the closing Mass, he asked to personally bless a baby girl born with anencephaly, a condition in which a large part of the brain is missing. Most children with the condition do not survive or are aborted. The pope’s gesture, in the view of Vatican officials, spoke much louder than a speech about abortion.

-- The 76-year-old pope’s high energy level during the trip, especially his enthusiasm in crowd settings, put to rest any concerns about his age or health.

As he heads back to Rome, the success of this trip is going to segue into tough challenges. When September rolls around, he’ll go from a long honeymoon into a season of expected results on a wide variety of issues, including Curia reform, the Vatican bank, collegiality and governance.

At some point, he’ll be expected to spell out some details behind the popular phrases like “going to the outskirts” to evangelize. Does that mean building bridges to disaffected Catholics? Opening up the sacraments for those who are divorced and remarried? Bringing more lay men and women in to decision-making positions at the highest church levels? Asking bishops and priests to give up some of the material privileges they enjoy?

We’ll see in coming months if he takes his own advice and shakes things up at the Vatican. And we’ll see if he makes a bit of a “mess” along the way.

“Silence!” he said. “Let’s listen to the Holy Spirit!”

(CNA/EWTN News) The young Brazilian Felipe Passos moved the hearts of three million World Youth Day participants, including Pope Francis himself, when he told the story of how he became bound to a wheelchair and discovered “the Cross.”

Felipe, 23, spoke at the World Youth Day prayer vigil July 27 at Copacabana Beach.

He told how at the end of the past World Youth Day, held in Madrid in 2011, he made two spiritual promises. He promised to stay chaste until marriage and to work hard so his prayer group of Ponta Grossa, in Brazil’s southern state of Paraná, could participate in this year’s World Youth Day in Rio de Janeiro.

With few resources, Felipe and his friends began saving money by working several hard jobs at the same time that they prepared themselves spiritually: praying, adoring the Blessed Sacrament, fasting and doing works of solidarity.

Then a horrible thing happened.

“In January of this year, two days before turning 23, two youths entered my house, armed, to rob the money we had gathered with so much sacrifice,” said Felipe.

“I thought of the months of great efforts, of my family’s sacrificing, of my friends and colleagues… in what would have been snatched from us and I decided I would not give it,” he added July 27.

Felipe saved the savings of the group, but received a gunshot wound that almost ended his life.

“I was clinically dead, I had several cardiac arrests, and the doctor told my parents in the hospital ‘this boy has no hope,’ but I’m here and my community is here because of God’s mercy,” remarked Felipe.

In front of a shocked crowd and in front of Pope Francis, who looked at him attentively, the Brazilian told how he was in coma, breathing through a tube, while his community offered prayer intentions and sacrifices so he would heal.

Finally, when he became conscience, the first thing he did was ask for the Eucharist and after receiving it, he recovered rapidly.

But Felipe, who was then bound to a wheelchair, stated “this is my cross, the cross the Lord sent me to come closer to him, to live more openly his grace and love.”

When the three million youths broke out clapping, Felipe interrupted them.

“Silence!” he said. “Let’s listen to the Holy Spirit!”

The 23-year-old then asked each of the youths present to take the cross they had hung around their neck, to hold it and look at it.

Felipe invited them to meditate in silence on the questions: “What is the cross that the Lord has given me? What is the cross that he wants me to carry for his love?”

Everyone present, including bishops and cardinals, contemplated their own cross around their neck. The wheelchair-bound young man’s words created a unique moment of profound silence along the entire Copacabana beach.

Felipe finished his testimony asking for prayers as well as for Pope Francis’ blessing.

Krakow, Poland to host World Youth Day 2016

Pope’s triple marching orders to young people: "Go, do not be afraid, serve”

The following comes from the Vatican Insider:

Pope Francis set on fire the hearts of 3 million young people from 195 countries at World Youth Day (WYD) in Rio on Sunday, when he told them, with inspiring words, to bring Christ’s Gospel to all nations. By doing so, he said, “you are bringing God’s power to pluck up and break down evil and violence, to destroy and overthrow the barriers of selfishness, intolerance and hatred, so as to build a new world”

He gave them these final marching orders at the closing WYD mass on Rio’s breathtaking Copacabana beach, July 28.  It was the biggest mass ever celebrated on Latin American soil, and the second largest in WYD history.  It was memorable not only for the joyful Latin American music and the singing of Charismatic and other groups, but also for the emotional moment when a young Brazilian couple brought their newborn anacephalic (without a brain) daughter to the Pope at the offertory, as a gift to God.

As Francis spoke he could see, stretching before him along the waterfront, young people from all continents, cultures, languages, waving the flags of their nations.  400,000 had come from around the world, the rest were from Brazil.  Most had slept overnight in sleeping bags on the beachfront or on the street parallel to it. They had given him a rapturous, emotional welcome when he arrived in his partially covered jeep; they jumped up and down, danced and roared with joy as he passed among them blessing them and, at one point, even drinking mate offered by a pilgrim.

Speaking to them with passion, the humble Jesuit pope summarized his message in three points:  “Go! Do not be Afraid! Serve!”

“Go and make disciples of all nations”, he told them   This WYD had been “a wonderful experience”, he declared; they had “met Jesus” and “sensed the joy of the faith” with other young people, but now “you must go and pass on this experience to others”, because “Jesus is calling you to be a disciple with a mission!”

They must not keep this experience “locked up” in their own life, small parish group or movement, he said, “Because that would be like withholding oxygen from a flame that was burning strongly. Faith is a flame that grows stronger the more it is passed on, so that everyone may know, love and confess Jesus Christ, the Lord of life and history.” 

They must share the Gospel with others, he said, because that is the command Jesus gives to the whole Church, “and that includes you”.  It is a command “that is born not from a desire for domination or power but from the force of love, from the fact that Jesus first came into our midst and gave his life in order to save us and to show us the love and mercy of God.”

He reminded them that “Jesus does not treat us as slaves, but as free men, as friends, as brothers and sisters” and “he not only sends us, he accompanies us, he is always beside us in our mission of love”.    

Jesus “sends us to everyone. The Gospel is for everyone, not just for some”, he declared, as he urged them, “Do not be afraid to go and to bring Christ into every area of life, to the fringes of society, even to those who seem farthest away, most indifferent” because Jesus “wants everyone to feel the warmth of his mercy and his love”.

Pope Francis repeated, “Do not be afraid” to proclaim the Gospel even if they felt they had “no particular preparation”, because “when we go to proclaim Christ, it is he himself who goes before us and guides us” .Moreover, the whole Church and the saints in heaven will accompany them.  

Finally, he told said, they are called “to serve” people because “the life of Jesus is a life for others. It is a life of service.” He reminded them that “Evangelizing means bearing personal witness to the love of God, it is overcoming our selfishness, and it is serving by bending down to wash the feet of our brethren, as Jesus did.”

He promised that if they followed his three key ideas - Go, do not be afraid, and serve, “you will experience that the one who transmits the joy of faith receives joy.” As he bade them farewell, he told them, “Jesus counts on you, the Church counts on you, the Pope counts on you”, and he said he looked forward to meeting them again at the next WYD in Krakow, in 2016.

Pope Francis to youths: 'The Church needs your enthusiasm!"

Pope Francis to Youth: “Go and make disciples of all nations”

The following comes from the Catholic Herald:

Brother Bishops and Priests,

Dear Young Friends,

“Go and make disciples of all nations”. With these words,Jesus is speaking to each one of us, saying: “It was wonderful to take part in World Youth Day, to live the faith together with young people from the four corners of the earth, but now you must go, now you must pass on this experience to others.” Jesus is calling you to be a disciple with a mission! Today, in the light of the word of God that we have heard, what is the Lord saying to us? Three simple ideas: Go, do not be afraid, and serve.

1. Go. During these days here in Rio, you have been able to enjoy the wonderful experience of meeting Jesus, meeting him together with others, and you have sensed the joy of faith. But the experience of this encounter must not remain locked up in your life or in the small group of your parish, your movement, or your community. That would be like withholding oxygen from a flame that was burning strongly. Faith is a flame that grows stronger the more it is shared and passed on, so that everyone may know, love and confess Jesus Christ, the Lord of life and history (cf. Rom10:9).

Careful, though! Jesus did not say: “if you would like to, if you have the time”, but: “Go and make disciples of all nations.” Sharing the experience of faith, bearing witness to the faith, proclaiming the Gospel: this is a command that the Lord entrusts to the whole Church, and that includes you; but it is a command that is born not from a desire for domination or power but from the force of love, from the fact that Jesus first came into our midst and gave us, not a part of himself, but the whole of himself, he gave his life in order to save us and to show us the love and mercy of God. Jesus does not treat us as slaves, but as free men, as friends, as brothers and sisters; and he not only sends us, he accompanies us, he is always beside us in our mission of love.

Where does Jesus send us? There are no borders, no limits: he sends us to everyone. The Gospel is for everyone, not just for some. It is not only for those who seem closer to us, more receptive, more welcoming. It is for everyone. Do not be afraid to go and to bring Christ into every area of life, to the fringes of society, even to those who seem farthest away, most indifferent. The Lord seeks all, he wants everyone to feel the warmth of his mercy and his love.

In particular, I would like Christ’s command: “Go” to resonate in you young people from the Church in Latin America, engaged in the continental mission promoted by the Bishops. Brazil, Latin America, the whole world needs Christ! Saint Paul says: “Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel!” (1 Cor 9:16). This continent has received the proclamation of the Gospel which has marked its history and borne much fruit. Now this proclamation is entrusted also to you, that it may resound with fresh power. The Church needs you, your enthusiasm, your creativity and the joy that is so characteristic of you. A great Apostle of Brazil, Blessed José de Anchieta, set off on the mission whenhe was only nineteen years old. Do you know what the best tool is for evangelising the young? Another young person. This is the path to follow!

2. Do not be afraid. Some people might think: “I have no particular preparation, how can I go and proclaim the Gospel?” My dear friend, your fear is not so very different from that of Jeremiah, a young man like you, when he was called by God to be a prophet. We have just heard his words: “Ah,Lord God! Behold, I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth”. God says the same thing to you as he said to Jeremiah: “Be not afraid … for I am with you to deliver you” (Jer 1:7,8). He is with us! “Do not be afraid!” When we go to proclaim Christ, it is he himself who goes before us and guides us. When he sent his disciples on mission, he promised: “I am with you always” (Mt28:20). And this is also true for us! Jesus does not leave us alone, he never leaves you alone! He always accompanies you.

And then, Jesus did not say: “One of you go”, but “All of you go”: we are sent together. Dear young friends, be aware of the companionship of the whole Church and also the communion of the saints on this mission. When we face challenges together, then we are strong, we discover resources we did not know we had. Jesus did not call the Apostles to live in isolation, he called them to form a group, a community. I would like to address you, dear priests concelebrating with me at this Eucharist: you have come to accompany your young people, and this is wonderful, to share this experience of faith with them! But it is a stage on the journey. Continue to accompany them with generosity and joy, help them to become actively engaged in the Church; never let them feel alone!

3. The final word: serve. The opening words of the psalm that we proclaimed are: “Sing to the Lord a new song” (Psalm95:1). What is this new song? It does not consist of words, it is not a melody, it is the song of your life, it is allowing our life to be identified with that of Jesus, it is sharing his sentiments, his thoughts, his actions. And the life of Jesus is a life for others. It is a life of service. In our Second Reading today, Saint Paul says: “I have made myself a slave to all, that I might win the more” (1 Cor9:19). In order to proclaim Jesus, Paul made himself “a slaveto all”. Evangelising means bearing personal witness to the love of God, it is overcoming our selfishness, it is serving bybending down to wash the feetof our brethren, as Jesus did.

Go, do not be afraid, and serve. If you follow these three ideas, you will experience that the one who evangelizes is evangelized, the one who transmits the joy of faith receives joy. Dear young friends, as you return to your homes, do not be afraid to be generous with Christ, to bear witness to his Gospel. In the first Reading, when God sends the prophet Jeremiah, he gives him the power to “pluck up and to break down, to destroy and to overthrow, to build and to plant” (1:10). It is the same for you. Bringing the Gospel is bringing God’s power to pluck up and break down evil and violence, to destroy and overthrow the barriers of selfishness, intolerance and hatred, so as to build a new world.

Jesus Christ is counting on you! The Church is counting on you! The Pope is counting on you! May Mary, Mother of Jesus and our Mother, always accompany you with her tenderness: “Go and make disciples of all nations”. Amen.

The field of faith is your own heart, Pope Francis tells WYD pilgrims

 (CNA/EWTN News) Pope Francis told the crowd of pilgrims at World Youth Day's Saturday night prayer vigil that the “field of faith” is found in their own hearts, which Christ wishes to till.

“This, dear young people, means that the real ‘Campus Fidei,’ the field of faith, is your own heart, it is your life,” the Pope told the pilgrims gathered in Rio de Janeiro at the beginning of a vigil July 27. The prayer vigil was held on Copacabana beach rather than “Campus Fidei” in Guaratiba, which was rained out.

He stressed that the deepest meaning of “Campus Fidei” is not a geographical place, like the massive plain east of Rio that was closed to pilgrims after heavy rains. Rather, the field of faith is, most profoundly, the human heart.

“It is your life that Jesus wants to enter with his word, with his presence. Please, let Christ and his word enter your life, blossom and grow.”

Pope Francis examined his namesake, St. Francis of Assisi, as a model of Christian life. The saint was called to rebuild Christ's house, and realized that his call was not merely “a question of repairing a stone building, but about doing his part for the life of the Church.”

Just as St. Francis was called to “make the countenance of Christ shine ever more brightly” in the Church, so “today too,” he told the young people, God is “calling each of you to follow him in his Church and to be missionaries.”

Taking the intended site of his speech as an inspiration, the Pope used the image of a field in three ways: a place for sowing seeds; a training ground; and a construction site.

The human heart is the field where Christ sows the seed of God's word, Pope Francis taught, using the imagery of the parable of the sower in Matthew 13. “What kind of ground are we? What kind of terrain do we want to be?”

At times, he said, “we are like the path,” not allowing the word of God to change our lives because we have “let ourselves be numbed by all the superficial voices competing for our attention” instead of resting in calmness and slowness with the Lord.

We can also fail to bear fruit by faltering in the face of difficulties when “we don't have the courage to swim against the tide;” or at times “negative feelings” choke God's word in us.

Pope Francis encouraged the pilgrims, saying that “today I am sure that the seed is falling on good soil, that you want to be good soil.”

He contrasted “good soil” with a desire to be Christian “part-time,” “superficially,” or “for show.”

“Do not be Christians of the facade, be Christians who are authentic!” he said. “Ask for the Lord to sow his seed in your heart.”

“I am sure that you don’t want to be duped by a false freedom, always at the beck and call of momentary fashions and fads,” he added.

Pope Francis encouraged them to be “aiming high,” resolving to maintain the lofty standards of truth, goodness, and beauty.

The Bishop of Rome's next image considered the field of faith as an athletic training ground, saying that being a disciple of Christ is much like joining a soccer team. Both require discipline and training.

He referred to St. Paul's writing that “athletes deny themselves all sorts of things” in order to “win a crown of leaves that withers,” and then added that “Jesus offers us something bigger than the World Cup,” soccer's international tournament which is to be held next summer in Brazil.

Christ offers “the possibility of a fulfilled and fruitful life; he also offers us a future with him, an endless future, eternal life,” Pope Francis preached.

“But he asks us to train, 'to get in shape,' so that we can face every situation in life undaunted, bearing witness to our faith.”

Such spiritual exercises, the Pope said, include talking with him in prayer, “our daily conversation with God." Do we really seek time in conversation with God, he asked, calling prayer also a "dialogue" with God.

Other spiritual exercises Pope Francis mentioned were the sacraments and loving one another, “yearning to listen, to understand, to forgive, to be accepting and to help others, everybody, with no one excluded or ostracized.”

Finally, Pope Francis spoke of a field as a construction site, saying God constructs the Church of “living stones,” and that “we are never alone” as we journey “on the same path.”

“Jesus is asking us to build up his Church, but not as a little chapel which holds only a small group of persons. He asks us to make his living Church so large that it can hold all of humanity, that it can be a home for everyone!”

Christ says “to me, to you, to each of us,” Pope Francis reflected: “Go and make disciples of all nations.”

“Tonight, let us answer him: Yes, I too want to be a living stone; together we want to build up the Church of Jesus!”

The desire, so characteristic of young people, to build up a more just, fraternal society, Pope Francis said, must begin with each person becoming more just and fraternal.

Dear friends, never forget that you are the field of faith! You are Christ’s athletes! You are called to build a more beautiful Church and a better world.”

Mary is the model for building a beautiful Church and better world, he assured the pilgrims as he concluded.

“All together, let us join Mary in saying to God: let it be done to me as you say. Amen!”