Vatican, 09 May, 2021 / 10:20 am (ACI Africa).
Pope Francis said Sunday that loving like Christ requires a rejection of the worldly loves of money, success, vanity, and power.
“To love like Christ means saying 'no' to other ‘loves’ that the world offers us: love of money – those who love money do not love as Jesus loves -- love of success, vanity, of power,” the pope said from the window of the Apostolic Palace on May 9.
“These deceptive paths of ‘love’ distance us from the Lord’s love and lead us to become more and more selfish, narcissistic, overbearing. And being overbearing leads to a degeneration of love, to the abuse of others, to making our loved ones suffer.”
In his Regina Caeli address, the pope told pilgrims gathered in St. Peter’s Square that “Jesus asks us to abide in his love,” not in “our own self-worship.”
“Those who dwell in self-worship, live in the mirror, always looking at themselves,” he said.