Vatican City, 15 June 2015 (VIS) –
Today the homily in Spanish pronounced by the Pope last Friday in the
Basilica of St. John Lateran during the Third Worldwide Priests'
Retreat, organised by the International Catholic Charismatic Renewal
Services (ICCRS) and the Catholic Fraternity, dedicated to the theme
“Called to sanctity for the new evangelisation” based on the
apostolic exhortation “Evangelii gaudium”. Before the Eucharistic
celebration, the Holy Father reflected with those present on the
theme “Transformed by love and for love”, and answered five
questions from attendees. The following is an extract from the
homily, which focused on God's tenderness.
“How good it is to listen to God Who
teaches me to progress, the Almighty Who stoops down to me and
teaches me to walk. … And God's closeness is this tenderness: He
taught me to walk, and without Him I would not know how to walk in
the Spirit.
“How often I think that we are afraid
of God's tenderness, and since we are afraid of God's tenderness, we
do not allow ourselves to experience Him and as a result are at times
hard, harsh and punishing; we are pastors without tenderness. What
does Jesus tell us in Luke Chapter 15, about that pastor who noticed
that he had only ninety-nine sheep and that one was missing? He
locked them up safely and went looking for the other one, which was
entangled in thorns. He did not hit or reprimand her; he took her in
his arms, put her on his shoulders, took her home and healed her. Do
you do likewise with your parishioners, when you notice that one is
missing from the flock, or are we accustomed to being a Church with
one sheep in the flock and ninety-nine lost on the mountain?
“Today I ask you during this retreat
to be pastors with God's tenderness, to leave the whip in the
sacristy and to be tender pastors, even with those who cause you the
most problems. It is a grace, it is a divine grace. We do not believe
in an ethereal God – we believe in a God made flesh, with a heart,
and this heart says to us today, 'they come to me if they are tired,
overwhelmed, and I soothe them; treat my little ones with tenderness,
with the same tenderness with which I treat them”. The heart of
Christ tells us this today, and it is what I ask of you and of myself
in this Mass today”.
During the Eucharistic celebration the
Pope entrusted the missionary mandate to the priests.
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