Pope Francis says "Dear seminarians, take up your rosary and ask Mary, Queen and Mother of Mercy, to help you unveil the mysteries of the priesthood to which God calls..." FULL TEXT
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SPEECH OF THE HOLY FATHER FRANCIS
TO THE BARCELONA SEMINAR COMMUNITY
Hall of the Popes
Saturday, December 10, 2022
_____________________________________
Dear Chancellor,
Dear students of the Barcelona Council Seminary:
I thank you from the bottom of my heart for his words, and I welcome you to this house of Peter, which is the house of the whole Church. I know that you have longed for this meeting and have insistently asked your Archbishop to be able to be here. Come, persevering prayer bears fruit, never forget it. It is also important to invoke the mediation of the Church, so do not stop asking for the prayers of your pastors and the faithful, so that God grants you perseverance in the path of good.
When speaking to the formandi there are two temptations, that of focusing on the bad, taking into account only the negative experiences, and that of trying to present an idyllic and unreal world. That is why, staying on this theme of prayer with which we have begun, I found interesting a little book by a holy bishop of your land, Saint Manuel González, who recounts in a priestly rosary the good and the bad that questions us. , making it a prayer that, through the intercession of our Immaculate Mother, we present to God.
Remember that, when you are a priest, your first obligation will be a life of prayer that is born of gratitude for that preferential love that God showed you by calling you to his service. This is the first joyful mystery from which everything is born. In this phase of formation in which they find themselves, it would do them good if in her prayer they could confront the attitudes of the Blessed Virgin, asking themselves: how was she when God called her?, and how was I? With what zeal do I consider my future priestly life? Will I rise up, says Saint Manuel, like a bubble in a boiling pot of love, to bring God to the world? Will I take him to the mountains, to the most arduous and painful?
The priest "is not a dominator of souls for silver and gold... his wealth, his power, is only the virtue of the name of Jesus", that is, making him present in the Eucharist, in the sacraments, in the word , so that it is born in the hearts of men, to be in everything and always their instrument. For this we give ourselves up, like Jesus, in the temple, as victims, for the redemption of the world. And, in the last joyful mystery there is a very important idea for your whole life, never leave it behind, I mean Jesus lost in the temple, that Jesus whom I always have to go back to look for in the tabernacle. Get lost there with Him, to wait for his faithful: «the good priest knows very well that, as long as he has eyes to cry, hands to mortify himself and a body to afflict, he has no right to say that he has done everything he had to do for the souls that are entrusted to him».
This installment prefigures what you can meditate on the painful mysteries. God asks us for sacrifice, sacrifice of the heart, surrendering our will, as He proposes to us in Gethsemane; sacrifice of sensitivity, in the asceticism that we contemplate in the flagellation; sacrifice of honor, so Spanish, thinking —as they sing in the Lenten hymn— that seeking the laurel of nobility, of academic title, of worldly praise, distances us from God, and rather we must aspire to the crowns of thorns that identify us with the Lord. There is the sacrifice of assuming one's own cross and beginning a path, often of abandonment, it is the sacrifice of life. Looking at the cross we raise our eyes to heaven and see our destiny. Do you find it difficult? It is not, simple things are enough: the hard bed, the narrow room, the scant and poor table, the nights at the head of the dying, the very early days opening the church before the bars, and waiting, accompanying Jesus alone , to sinners and to those wounded on the path of life.
And we come to the glorious mysteries, which are our thanksgiving for the Mass of Jesus on the cross. After the triumph of the resurrection, Jesus entered the sanctuary of heaven and from there he perpetuates this continuous thanksgiving. Seeing him seated at the right hand of the Father calls us to hope and fills us with joy, because he assures us of paradise. For this, God sends the Holy Spirit, the only one who can teach us these mysteries, and one day, he will give you the gift of being priests of Christ. Never stop enjoying and remembering this favorite love that pours out and will pour out abundantly in your heart, at your ordination and in the rest of your days. Never put out that fire that will make you intrepid preachers of the Gospel, dispensers of divine treasures. Unite your flesh to that of Jesus, like Mary, to immolate yourself with Him in the Eucharistic sacrifice, and also, in the glory of his triumph.
Dear seminarians, take up your rosary and ask Mary, Queen and Mother of Mercy, to help you unveil the mysteries of the priesthood to which God calls you, contemplating the mysteries of his Son, accepting that the joy of following and perfect identification on the cross are the only path to glory. God bless you.
TO THE BARCELONA SEMINAR COMMUNITY
Hall of the Popes
Saturday, December 10, 2022
_____________________________________
Dear Chancellor,
Dear students of the Barcelona Council Seminary:
I thank you from the bottom of my heart for his words, and I welcome you to this house of Peter, which is the house of the whole Church. I know that you have longed for this meeting and have insistently asked your Archbishop to be able to be here. Come, persevering prayer bears fruit, never forget it. It is also important to invoke the mediation of the Church, so do not stop asking for the prayers of your pastors and the faithful, so that God grants you perseverance in the path of good.
When speaking to the formandi there are two temptations, that of focusing on the bad, taking into account only the negative experiences, and that of trying to present an idyllic and unreal world. That is why, staying on this theme of prayer with which we have begun, I found interesting a little book by a holy bishop of your land, Saint Manuel González, who recounts in a priestly rosary the good and the bad that questions us. , making it a prayer that, through the intercession of our Immaculate Mother, we present to God.
Remember that, when you are a priest, your first obligation will be a life of prayer that is born of gratitude for that preferential love that God showed you by calling you to his service. This is the first joyful mystery from which everything is born. In this phase of formation in which they find themselves, it would do them good if in her prayer they could confront the attitudes of the Blessed Virgin, asking themselves: how was she when God called her?, and how was I? With what zeal do I consider my future priestly life? Will I rise up, says Saint Manuel, like a bubble in a boiling pot of love, to bring God to the world? Will I take him to the mountains, to the most arduous and painful?
The priest "is not a dominator of souls for silver and gold... his wealth, his power, is only the virtue of the name of Jesus", that is, making him present in the Eucharist, in the sacraments, in the word , so that it is born in the hearts of men, to be in everything and always their instrument. For this we give ourselves up, like Jesus, in the temple, as victims, for the redemption of the world. And, in the last joyful mystery there is a very important idea for your whole life, never leave it behind, I mean Jesus lost in the temple, that Jesus whom I always have to go back to look for in the tabernacle. Get lost there with Him, to wait for his faithful: «the good priest knows very well that, as long as he has eyes to cry, hands to mortify himself and a body to afflict, he has no right to say that he has done everything he had to do for the souls that are entrusted to him».
This installment prefigures what you can meditate on the painful mysteries. God asks us for sacrifice, sacrifice of the heart, surrendering our will, as He proposes to us in Gethsemane; sacrifice of sensitivity, in the asceticism that we contemplate in the flagellation; sacrifice of honor, so Spanish, thinking —as they sing in the Lenten hymn— that seeking the laurel of nobility, of academic title, of worldly praise, distances us from God, and rather we must aspire to the crowns of thorns that identify us with the Lord. There is the sacrifice of assuming one's own cross and beginning a path, often of abandonment, it is the sacrifice of life. Looking at the cross we raise our eyes to heaven and see our destiny. Do you find it difficult? It is not, simple things are enough: the hard bed, the narrow room, the scant and poor table, the nights at the head of the dying, the very early days opening the church before the bars, and waiting, accompanying Jesus alone , to sinners and to those wounded on the path of life.
And we come to the glorious mysteries, which are our thanksgiving for the Mass of Jesus on the cross. After the triumph of the resurrection, Jesus entered the sanctuary of heaven and from there he perpetuates this continuous thanksgiving. Seeing him seated at the right hand of the Father calls us to hope and fills us with joy, because he assures us of paradise. For this, God sends the Holy Spirit, the only one who can teach us these mysteries, and one day, he will give you the gift of being priests of Christ. Never stop enjoying and remembering this favorite love that pours out and will pour out abundantly in your heart, at your ordination and in the rest of your days. Never put out that fire that will make you intrepid preachers of the Gospel, dispensers of divine treasures. Unite your flesh to that of Jesus, like Mary, to immolate yourself with Him in the Eucharistic sacrifice, and also, in the glory of his triumph.
Dear seminarians, take up your rosary and ask Mary, Queen and Mother of Mercy, to help you unveil the mysteries of the priesthood to which God calls you, contemplating the mysteries of his Son, accepting that the joy of following and perfect identification on the cross are the only path to glory. God bless you.
Source: Vatican.va with Screenshot
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