CHRIST'S INVITATION TO TAKE UP DAILY CROSS AND FOLLOW HIM

VATICAN CITY, APR 1, 2001 (VIS) - Following his return to the Vatican from Our Lady of Suffrage and St. Augustine of Canterbury Parish in Rome, Pope John Paul, speaking from his study window overlooking St. Peter's Square, had his traditional weekly appointment with the faithful gathered to pray the noon angelus with him.

Before the prayer he reflected on Christ's "pressing invitation: ... 'If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me'." The Pope went on to say that "this demanding condition, which He asks of all who wish to follow him, must be the Christian's lifestyle, which Lent exhorts us to verify, renew and deepen. Jesus does not propose mortification as a means unto itself. In reality 'denying oneself' and 'taking up the cross' are the equivalent of assuming right up to the end one's own responsibility before God and one's neighbor."

Christ's invitation to follow Him and take up the daily cross, recalled the Holy Father, "is the theme of my Message for the 16th World Youth Day which will be celebrated in local dioceses worldwide next Sunday, Palm Sunday. ... Is it not perhaps the Cross which guides, for over 15 years now, the pilgrimage of young people on World Youth Days? This Cross, which has gone around the world, next Sunday, at the end of Mass in St. Peter's Square, will be given by Rome's youth to those of Toronto, the Canadian city which will host the next world encounter of young people in July 2002."

"To prepare ourselves for this evocative celebration," the Pope concluded, "I invite you, young people of Rome, to come here to St. Peter's Square, this coming Thursday afternoon" for "a moment of prayer, reflection and celebration."

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