Apr 09 2008
“We Have Been Saved”
Pope Benedict has asked us to pray with him this month that Christians may not grow tired of proclaiming with their lives that Christ’s resurrection is the source of our hope and peace. In fact, Jesus, who revealed the love of God most clearly through His death on a cross and whose resurrection shows that death is not the end of human existence, is the world’s only hope and peace. We continue to pray with the Holy Father as we reflect on his “Urbi et Orbi” Message of Easter Sunday.
Dear Christian brothers and sisters in every part of the world, dear men and women whose spirit is sincerely open to the truth, let no heart be closed to the omnipotence of this redeeming love! Jesus Christ died and rose for all; he is our hope – true hope for every human being. Today, just as he did with his disciples in Galilee before returning to the Father, the risen Jesus now sends us everywhere as witnesses of his hope, and he reassures us: I am with you always, all days, until the end of the world (Matthew 28:20). Fixing the gaze of our spirit on the glorious wounds of his transfigured body, we can understand the meaning and value of suffering, we can tend the many wounds that continue to disfigure humanity in our own day. In his glorious wounds we recognize the indestructible signs of the infinite mercy of the God of whom the prophet says: it is he who heals the wounds of broken hearts, who defends the weak and proclaims the freedom of slaves, who consoles all the afflicted and bestows upon them the oil of gladness instead of a mourning robe, a song of praise instead of a sorrowful heart (Isaiah 61:1-3). If with humble trust we draw near to him, we encounter in his gaze the response to the deepest longings of our heart: to know God and to establish with him a living relationship in an authentic communion of love, which can fill our lives, our interpersonal and social relations with that same love. For this reason, humanity needs Christ: in him, our hope, “we have been saved” (Romans 8:24).
Today’s Readings: Acts 8:1b-8; Psalm 66:1-3a, 4-7a; John 6:35-40
