In his homily, Pope Francis encouraged members of the Church to return “to the council’s pure sources of love.”
“Let us rediscover the council’s passion and renew our own passion for the council,” he said. “Immersed in the mystery of the Church, Mother and Bride, let us also say, with St. John XXIII: Gaudet Mater Ecclesia.”
Francis also warned Catholics about the strategy of the devil, who sows weeds of division among the faithful. “Let us not succumb to his flattery, let us not give in to the temptation of polarization,” he urged.
“How many times since the council have Christians gone out of their way to choose a side in the Church, not realizing that they were tearing their Mother’s heart,” the pope said. “How many times have they preferred to be ‘supporters of their own group’ rather than servants of all, progressives and conservatives rather than brothers and sisters, ‘of the right’ or ‘of the left’ rather than of Jesus; standing up as ‘guardians of the truth’ or ‘soloists of novelty,’ rather than recognizing themselves as humble and grateful children of holy Mother Church.”
All people are children of God and our brothers, he added. “The Lord does not want us this way: We are his sheep, his flock, and we are so only together, united. Let us overcome polarization and guard communion, let us become more and more ‘one,’ as Jesus pleaded before he gave his life for us.”
Pope Francis noted that there is always the temptation to start from one’s self and one’s agenda, rather than from God and his Gospel.
We “let ourselves be caught up in the winds of worldliness in order to chase the fashions of the moment or to turn back the time that Providence has granted us,” he said. “Yet let us be careful: both the ‘progressivism’ that lines up behind the world and the traditionalism — or ‘indietrism’ — that longs for a bygone world are not evidence of love, but of infidelity.”
“Let us rediscover the council in order to restore primacy to God, to what is essential: to a Church madly in love with its Lord and with all the men and women whom he loves; to a Church that is rich in Jesus and poor in assets; to a Church that is free and freeing. This was the path that the council pointed out to the Church,” he said.
Hannah Brockhaus is Catholic News Agency's senior Rome correspondent. She grew up in Omaha, Nebraska, and has a degree in English from Truman State University in Missouri.
