Pope Francis gifts 60 Bibles on first Sunday of the Word of God
Jan 27,2020
On the first Sunday dedicated to the Word of God, Pope Francis celebrated Mass in the Vatican, with very significant gestures.
For instance, the same lectern used during the Second Vatican Council was used. Following the readings, the Gospel book was enthroned before the altar.
In his homily, the pope reflected on Jesus’ way of teaching. He said the long-awaited Messiah began his teaching far from Jerusalem. Thus, he showed that Jesus, the Word of God, doesn’t meet people where they feel confident, but rather, where there is doubt and confusion, to offer a way out.
POPE FRANCIS
The Word that saves does not go looking for well-preserved, clean, safe places. It comes into our complexities, into our darkness. Today, as then, God desires to visit those places where we think He doesn’t go.
The pope also said the help Jesus offers can be rejected out of the fear of facing oneself in the dark places of one’s personal life
POPE FRANCIS
How many times are we the ones who close the door, preferring to hide our confusion, our darkness and falsehoods. We seal them inside ourselves, while we go to the Lord with some formal prayer, being careful not to let his truth shake us inside. This is hidden hypocrisy.
After the celebration, the pope personally gave Bibles to 60 people from different walks of life.
Among them were Italian scientist Antonino Zichichi and Rome’s mid-fielder Nicolò Zaniolo, a promising player in Italian soccer.
Javier Romero
Translation: Claudia Torres
Copyright: Vatican Media
‘God Gives Us His Word So We Receive It as a Love Letter Addressed to Us Personally,’ Says Pope on 1st Sunday of the Word of God
Just Like Jesus Called Fishermen Where & As They Were, & Their Lives Changed on the Spot, Christ Wishes to Transform Our Lives Today
“Today Jesus speaks those same words to you: ‘Take heart, I am here with you, allow me to enter and your life will change.’”
Pope Francis underscored this today, Sunday, Jan. 26, 2020, the first Sunday of the Word of God, since he instituted it in his letter Aperuit Illis. This liturgical feast is to annually fall on the Third Sunday of Ordinary Time.
The Holy Father’s homily reminded how the Lord sought out people, where they were, as they were, and then their lives changed. He also called for faithful to welcome this change in their own lives, regardless of where they find themselves, by letting the Lord reach us through His Word.
The Lord, Francis said, gives each person His Word, so we can receive it like “a love letter” addressed to us.
Jesus, Pope Francis underscored, “is not afraid to explore the terrain of our hearts and to enter the roughest and most difficult corners of our lives.” “He knows,” the Pope reminded, “that His mercy alone can heal us, His presence alone can transform us and His word alone can renew us.”
“Change your life, for a new way of living has begun. The time when you lived for yourself is over; now is the time for living with and for God, with and for others, with and for love,” he said.
Jesus Began By Expressing God Comes to Meet & Transform, Despite Us Not Deserving It
Asking how the Lord began, the Holy Father recalled the Lord’s frequent reminder to repent, “for the kingdom of heaven is at hand”
“Jesus tells us that the kingdom of heaven is at hand, that God is near. Here is the novelty, the first message: God is not far from us. The One who dwells in heaven has come down to earth; he became man. He has torn down walls and shortened distances. We ourselves did not deserve this: he came down to meet us.
“This is a joyful message: God came to visit us in person, by becoming man. He did not embrace our human condition out of duty but out of love. For love, he took on our human nature, for one embraces what one loves. God took our human nature because he loves us and desires freely to give us the salvation that, alone and unaided, we cannot hope to attain.”
The Lord, the Holy Father reminded, wants to stay with us and give us the beauty of life, peace of heart, the joy of being forgiven and feeling loved.
“We can now understand,” the Pontiff said, “the direct demand that Jesus makes: “Repent”, in other words, ‘Change your life.’”
“Change your life,” Francis encouraged, “for a new way of living has begun. The time when you lived for yourself is over; now is the time for living with and for God, with and for others, with and for love.”
“That is why the Lord gives you his word, so that you can receive it like a love letter he has written to you, to help you realize that he is at your side. His word consoles and encourages us. At the same time it challenges us, frees us from the bondage of our selfishness and summons us to conversion.
“Today,” Francis said, “Jesus speaks those same words to you: “Take heart, I am here with you, allow me to enter and your life will change.” His Word, the Jesuit Pope emphasized, has the power to change our lives and to lead us out of darkness into the light.
Jesus Didn’t Seek Untouched, Clean & Safe Places, But Brought Message of Salvation to Obscurity & Darkness
If we consider where Jesus started his preaching, Francis observed, we see that he began from the very places that were then thought to be “in darkness.”
“Here,” he noted, “there is a message for us: the word of salvation does not go looking for untouched, clean and safe places. Instead, it enters the complex and obscure places in our lives.”
“Now, as then,” Francis continued, “God wants to visit the very places we think he will never go.”
He Stays to Transform, Even Though We Resist
“Yet,” the Pope recognized, “how often we are the ones who close the door, preferring to keep our confusion, our dark side and our duplicity hidden. We keep it locked up within, approaching the Lord with some rote prayers, wary lest his truth stir our hearts.”
Regardless, he reminded that today’s Gospel tells us how Jesus went anyway through Galilee preaching the Gospel and healing, passing “through all” of that varied and complex region.
“In the same way,” the Pope noted, he is not afraid to explore the terrain of our hearts and to enter the roughest and most difficult corners of our lives. He knows that his mercy alone can heal us, his presence alone can transform us and His word alone can renew us. So let us open the winding paths of our heart to Him, who walked “the road by the sea”; let us welcome into our hearts His Word.”
Jesus Called Fisherman Where & As They Where
Reflecting thirdly on to whom did Jesus begin to speak, Francis reminded that the first people to be called were fishermen, “not people carefully chosen for their abilities or devout people at prayer in the temple, but ordinary working people.”
Recalling how Jesus told them, ‘I will make you fishers of men,’ the Argentine Pontiff observed that Christ was speaking to fishermen, using the language they understood.
“Their lives changed on the spot,” Francis said, “He called them where they were and as they were, in order to make them sharers in his mission.”
To follow Jesus, he said, mere good works are not enough. Rather, he said, we have to listen daily to His call.
“He, who alone knows us and who loves us fully, leads us to put out into the deep of life. Just as he did with the disciples who heard him,” he said, noting that is why we need His Word, namely “so that we can hear, amid the thousands of other words in our daily lives, that one word that speaks to us not about things, but about life.”
Let’s Make Room for the Word of God
“Dear brothers and sisters,” Pope Francis appealed, “let us make room in our lives for the Word of God!”
“Each day,” he invited, “let us read a verse or two of the Bible. Let us begin with the Gospel: let us keep it open on our table, carry it in our pocket, read it on our cell phones, and allow it to inspire us daily.”
Pope Francis concluded, saying that when we do this, “we will discover that God is close to us, that he dispels our darkness and, with great love, leads our lives into deep waters.”
Read the source: https://zenit.org/articles/god-gives-us-his-word-so-we-receive-it-as-a-love-letter-addressed-to-us-personally-says-pope/
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Full Text of Pope’s Homily in English on ZENIT:
Pope Francis’ Homily for 1st Sunday of the Word of God (Full Text)
Copyright: Vatican Media
Pope Francis’ Homily for 1st Sunday of the Word of God (Full Text)
‘Today Jesus speaks those same words to you: ‘Take heart, I am here with you, allow me to enter and your life will change’”
Today, Sunday, Jan. 26, 2020, marks the first Sunday of the Word of God, since its institution by Pope Francis. In his letter Aperuit Illis, Pope Francis made the annual appointment, which is to always fall on the Third Sunday of Ordinary Time. Here is the Pope’s full homily this morning:
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“Jesus began to preach” (Mt 4:17). With these words, the evangelist Matthew introduces the ministry of Jesus. The One who is the Word of God has come to speak with us, in his own words and by his own life. On this first Sunday of the Word of God, let us go to the roots of his preaching, to the very source of the word of life. Today’s Gospel (Mt 4:12-23) helps us to know how, where and to whom Jesus began to preach.
1. How did he begin? With a very simple phrase: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (v. 17). This is the main message of all Jesus’ sermons: to tell us that the kingdom of heaven is at hand. What does this mean? The kingdom of heaven means the reign of God, that is, the way in which God reigns through his relationship with us. Jesus tells us that the kingdom of heaven is at hand, that God is near. Here is the novelty, the first message: God is not far from us. The One who dwells in heaven has come down to earth; he became man. He has torn down walls and shortened distances. We ourselves did not deserve this: he came down to meet us.
This is a joyful message: God came to visit us in person, by becoming man. He did not embrace our human condition out of duty but out of love. For love, he took on our human nature, for one embraces what one loves. God took our human nature because he loves us and desires freely to give us the salvation that, alone and unaided, we cannot hope to attain. He wants to stay with us and give us the beauty of life, peace of heart, the joy of being forgiven and feeling loved.
We can now understand the direct demand that Jesus makes: “Repent”, in other words, “Change your life”. Change your life, for a new way of living has begun. The time when you lived for yourself is over; now is the time for living with and for God, with and for others, with and for love. Today Jesus speaks those same words to you: “Take heart, I am here with you, allow me to enter and your life will change”. That is why the Lord gives you his word, so that you can receive it like a love letter he has written to you, to help you realize that he is at your side. His word consoles and encourages us. At the same time it challenges us, frees us from the bondage of our selfishness and summons us to conversion. Because his word has the power to change our lives and to lead us out of darkness into the light.
2. If we consider where Jesus started his preaching, we see that he began from the very places that were then thought to be “in darkness”. Both the first reading and the Gospel speak to us of people who “sat in the region and shadow of death”. They are the inhabitants of “the land of Zebulun and Naphtali, on the road by the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations” (Mt 4:15-16; cf. Is 8:23-9:1). Galilee of the nations, this region where Jesus began his preaching ministry, had been given this name because it was made up of people of different races and was home to a variety of peoples, languages and cultures. It was truly “on the road by the sea”, a crossroads. Fishermen, businessmen and foreigners all dwelt there. It was definitely not the place to find the religious purity of the chosen people. Yet Jesus started from there: not from the forecourt of the temple of Jerusalem, but from the opposite side of the country, from Galilee of the nations, from the border region, from a periphery.
Here there is a message for us: the word of salvation does not go looking for untouched, clean and safe places. Instead, it enters the complex and obscure places in our lives. Now, as then, God wants to visit the very places we think he will never go. Yet how often we are the ones who close the door, preferring to keep our confusion, our dark side and our duplicity hidden. We keep it locked up within, approaching the Lord with some rote prayers, wary lest his truth stir our hearts. But as today’s Gospel tells us: “Jesus went about all Galilee preaching the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every infirmity” (v. 23). He passed through all of that varied and complex region. In the same way, he is not afraid to explore the terrain of our hearts and to enter the roughest and most difficult corners of our lives. He knows that his mercy alone can heal us, his presence alone can transform us and his word alone can renew us. So let us open the winding paths of our heart to him, who walked “the road by the sea”; let us welcome into our hearts his word, which is “living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword … and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart” (Heb 4:12).
3. Finally, to whom did Jesus begin to speak? The Gospel says that, “as he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon who is called Peter and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen. And he said to them, ‘Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men’” (Mt 4:18-19). The first people to be called were fishermen: not people carefully chosen for their abilities or devout people at prayer in the temple, but ordinary working people.
Let us think about what Jesus said to them: I will make you fishers of men. He was speaking to fishermen, using the language they understood. Their lives changed on the spot. He called them where they were and as they were, in order to make them sharers in his mission. “Immediately they left their nets and followed him” (v. 20). Why immediately? Because they felt drawn. They did not hurry off because they had received an order, but because they were drawn by love. To follow Jesus, mere good works are not enough; we have to listen daily to his call. He, who alone knows us and who loves us fully, leads us to put out into the deep of life. Just as he did with the disciples who heard him.
That is why we need his word: so that we can hear, amid the thousands of other words in our daily lives, that one word that speaks to us not about things, but about life.
Dear brothers and sisters, let us make room in our lives for the word of God! Each day, let us read a verse or two of the Bible. Let us begin with the Gospel: let us keep it open on our table, carry it in our pocket, read it on our cell phones, and allow it to inspire us daily. We will discover that God is close to us, that he dispels our darkness and, with great love, leads our lives into deep waters.
[Vatican-provided prepared text] [Original language: Italian]
© Vatican Media
ANGELUS ADDRESS: On Sunday of the Word of God, the 3rd Sunday of Ordinary Time
‘Jesus Proclaims the Central Nucleus of His Teaching: “Repent for the Kingdom of Heaven Is at Hand’
Here is a ZENIT translation of the address Pope Francis gave today, before and after praying the midday Angelus with those gathered in St. Peter’s Square. Present today also were the youngsters of Catholic Action of the Diocese of Rome, who, with the “Caravan of Peace,” ended the month of January, traditionally dedicated by them to the theme of peace. At the end of the Angelus prayer two of the youngsters, belonging to two different Roman parishes and invited to the papal apartment, read a message in the name of Catholic Action of Rome.
Read the source: https://zenit.org/articles/angelus-address-on-sunday-of-the-word-of-god-the-3rd-sunday-of-ordinary-time/
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Before the Angelus:
Dear Brothers and Sisters, good morning!
Today’s Gospel (Cf. Matthew 4:12-23) presents to us the beginning of Jesus’ public mission. This occurred in Galilee, land of the periphery in regard to Jerusalem, and regarded with suspicion because of the mixture with pagans. Nothing good or new was expected from that region; instead, it was precisely there that Jesus, who grew up in Nazareth of Galilee, began His preaching. He proclaimed the central nucleus of His teaching, synthesized in the appeal: “Repent, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand” (v. 17). This proclamation is like a powerful light beam that pierces the darkness and the fog, and recalls Isaiah’s prophecy read on Christmas Eve: “The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shined (9:2). With the coming of Jesus, light of the world, God the Father has shown humanity His closeness and friendship. They were given gratuitously beyond our merits. God’s closeness and God’s friendship aren’t a merit of ours; they are a gratuitous gift of God; we must cherish this gift.
The appeal to repentance, which Jesus addresses to all men of good will, is fully understood precisely in the light of the event of the manifestation of the Son of God, on which we meditated in past Sundays. So often it’s impossible to change life, to abandon the way of egoism, of evil, to abandon the way of sin, because the commitment to conversion is centered on oneself and on one’s own strength, and not on Christ and His Spirit. However, our adherence to the Lord cannot be reduced to a personal effort, no. To believe this would also be a sin of pride. Our adherence to the Lord cannot be reduced to a personal effort; instead, it must be expressed in a confident openness of the heart and of the mind to receive Jesus’ Good News. It’s this — the Word of Jesus, the Good News of Jesus, the Gospel –that changes the world and hearts! Therefore, we are called to trust the word of Christ, to open ourselves to the Father’s mercy and to allow ourselves to be transformed by the grace of the Holy Spirit. . It’s from here that the true path of conversion begins, precisely as it happened to the first disciples: the encounter with the divine Teacher, with His gaze, with His word, gave them the thrust to follow Him, to change their life, putting themselves concretely at the service of the Kingdom of God.
The surprising and decisive encounter with Jesus started the journey of the disciples, transforming them into heralds and witnesses of the love of God for His people. In imitation of these first heralds and messengers of the Word of God, may each one of us be able to move our steps in the footsteps of the Saviour, to offer hope to those that thirst for it.
May the Virgin Mary, to whom we turn in this Angelus prayer, sustain us in these resolutions and confirm them with Her maternal intercession.
[Original text: Italian] [ZENIT’s translation by Virginia M. Forrester]After the Angelus:
Dear Brothers and Sisters!
Today we celebrate for the first time the Sunday of the Word of God, instituted to celebrate and receive ever better the gift that God made and makes daily of His Word to His People. I thank the Dioceses <and> I thank the communities that have proposed initiatives to recall the centrality of Sacred Scripture in the life of the Church.
Observed tomorrow is the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp. In face of this huge tragedy, of this atrocity, indifference isn’t admissible and memory is a duty. Tomorrow we are all invited to engage in a moment of prayer and recollection, each one saying in his own heart: never again, never again!
Being held today is the Wold Day of Hansen’s disease patients. We are close to all persons affected by it and to all those that, in different ways, take care of them. I also wish to be close and to pray for the persons sick with the virus that has spread in China. May the Lord receive the deceased in His peace, comfort the families and sustain the great commitment of the Chinese community, already implemented to combat the epidemic.
I greet all of you from Italy and from several countries, in particular the pilgrims of Valencia, Salamanca, Burgos, Santander and Valladolid; the students and the teachers od Murcia, Cuenca, Badajoz and those of Panama.
I greet the faithful of Tursi and the UNITALSI group of Lazio, which facilitates the participation of disabled persons in the General Audiences and in the Angelus, and which today is distributing the Missal with the Word of God for every day.
Now the companions have arrived [two youngsters of ACR next to the Pope]. I greet affectionately the boys and girls of Catholic Action, of the parishes and the Catholic schools of the Diocese of Rome! — also accompanied this year by the Auxiliary Bishop, Monsignor Selvadagi, by your parents and teachers and by the assistant priests, numerous ones of you have come at the end of the “Caravan of Peace.” I thank you for this initiative. And now we will listen together to the message of your friends, here next to me, who will read.
[Reading of the message at the end of the release of balloons]I wish you all a happy Sunday. And, please, don’t forget to pray for me. Enjoy your lunch and goodbye!