POPE EXPRESSES GRATITUDE FOR PRAYERS FOR JUBILEE ANNIVESARY

VATICAN CITY, OCT 15, 2003 (VIS) - In today's general audience, celebrated in St. Peter's Square, the Pope continued with the catechesis on the liturgy of Vespers which began last week.

"While Lauds are prayed in the morning, Vespers are recited at dusk, the hour when the evening sacrifice of incense was offered in the Temple of Jerusalem. At that hour, Jesus, after His death on the Cross, lay in the tomb, having offered Himself to the Father for the salvation of the world."

John Paul II recalled that after the invocation "My God, come in my aid," the hymn which is an expression of "praise of the Church in prayer" is recited. Afterward, there are two psalms and a scriptural canticle. After a short reading from the New Testament, the Magnificat is sung in order "to express the sense of the praise and action of the grace of God for the gift of Redemption."

"The liturgy of Vespers," he continued, "concludes with the prayer of Jesus, the Our Father, a synthesis of every praise and petition of God's children, regenerated by water and the Spirit. At the end of the day, the Christian tradition has made a link between forgiveness, asked of God in the Our Father, and the fraternal reconciliation of men among themselves: the sun must not set upon anyone's anger.

"The vespertine prayer," said the Holy Father, "concludes with an invocation that, in line with Christ crucified, expresses the abandonment of our existence into the hands of the Father, conscious that His blessing is always with us."

"I thank you with all my heart," the Pope told the Polish pilgrims during his greetings in various languages, "for your presence, today and during these 25 years, for your prayers and for all expressions of good will and communion. I am happy to be able to count on your spiritual help." Speaking in Italian, he thanked everyone for their wishes and prayers on the 25th anniversary of his pontificate.

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