The Pope invited us to look at the saints, whom he defined as “people full of God” and highlighted contemporary figures such as Maximiliano Kolbe, Mother Teresa of Calcutta or Archbishop Óscar Romero.
Pope’s Angelus for the Solemnity of All Saints
On the solemnity of All Saints, the Papa Franciscoin the prayer of Angelusalluded to the Gospel of Saint Matthew read today, in which Jesus proclaims the beatitudes“the identity card of the Christian and the path to holiness”, as the pontiff himself recalled in the apostolic exhortation Rejoice and rejoice.
The pontiff explained that Jesus’ words in that passage “show us a path, the path of love, which He Himself traveled first, becoming man, and which for us is, at the same time, a gift from God and our response.”
“We ask God to sanctify us, to make our hearts similar to his,” the Pope prayed, then quoting the blessed Carlo Acutis: “So that there is always less of me to leave room for God.”
The Pope also pointed out that the second key to today’s Gospel is “our response,” and stated: “The heavenly Father offers us his holiness, but he does not impose it on us.”
“It sows it in us, it makes us taste it and see its beauty, but then it waits and respects our ‘yes’. It leaves us the freedom to follow its good inspirations, to let ourselves get involved in its projects, to make its feelings our own, putting ourselves, as taught us, at the service of others, with an increasingly universal charity, open and directed to everyone, to the entire world,” he stressed.
“We see all this in the lives of the saints, even in our time,” Francis noted, and mentioned “Saint Maximiliano Kolbewho in Auschwitz asked to take the place of a father condemned to death”; or “in holy Teresa of Calcuttawho spent his existence serving the poorest of the poor”; or “in Bishop Saint Oscar Romeromurdered at the altar for having defended the rights of the last against the abuse of bullies.”
“In them, as in so many other saints – those we venerate on the altars and those ‘next door’, with whom we live every day -, we recognize brothers and sisters modeled by the beatitudes: poor, meek, merciful, hungry and thirsty for justice, architects of peace,” he expressed
Francis maintained that “they are people ‘full of God’, incapable of remaining indifferent to the needs of their neighbors; witnesses of luminous paths, which are also possible for us.”
The pontiff ended his reflection with some questions: “Do I ask God, in prayer, for the gift of a holy life? Do I allow myself to be guided by the good impulses that his Spirit awakens in me? Do I personally commit to practicing the Beatitudes?” of the Gospel, in the environments in which I live?”.+
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