A message from the Bishop of Rome
Recognizing Jesus in his truth
“But who do you say that I am?” asks jesus the disciples (Mt 16:15). “Still today, says Pope Francis, the question echoes in our conscience, as his disciples, and is decisive for our identity and our mission. Only if we recognize Jesus in his Truth, will we be able to see the truth in our human condition, and will we be able to make our contribution to the full humanization of society.”
At the root of the mystery of salvation, in fact, lies the will of a merciful God who does not want to surrender to the misunderstandings, failures and misery of man, but gives himself to the point of becoming a man himself in order to meet each person in his or her actual condition. This merciful love of God is what Simon Peter recognizes in Jesus’ face. The same face that we are called to recognize in the forms in which the Lord has assured us of his presence in our midst: […]
This truth of the faith is a truth that scandalizes, because it asks one to believe in Jesus, who, despite being in the form of God, emptied himself, humbled himself, taking on the form of a servant, even unto death on the cross, and for this God made him Lord of the Universe (cf. Phil 2:6-11). It is the truth that still today scandalizes those who cannot bear the mystery of God imprinted on the face of Christ. It is the truth that we cannot touch and embrace, as St Paul says, without entering into the mystery of Jesus Christ, and without making his feelings our own (cf. Phil 2:5). Only by beginning from the heart of Christ can we understand, profess and live his Truth.
In reality, the communion between the divine and human, fully realized in Jesus, is our destination, the culmination of human history according to the Father’s design. It is the blessedness of the encounter between our weakness and his greatness, between our smallness and his mercy which will compensate every one of our limitations. This aim is not only the horizon that illuminates our path, but is also what attracts us with his gentle strength; it is what offers a foretaste and lives here and is built day after day with all the good that we sow around us. These are the seeds that help to create a new, renewed humanity, where no one is left on the margins or discarded; where those who serve are greatest; where the small and the poor are accepted and helped.
Extract from the homily of the Holy Father,
on November 10th, 2015, in Florence
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