Pope Francis’ general audience again moves behind closed doors

Vatican City, Jun 6, 2018 / 04:19 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis Wednesday said that the sacrament of Confirmation is a gift meant to be shared with other people, both inside and outside of the Church, which he stressed is not only the hierarchy, but is made up of all baptized faithful.

In his June 6 general audience speech, the pope said the sacrament of Confirmation unites candidates more closely to the Church, and gives them a stronger identity as “a living member of the mystical body of Christ.”

“The mission of the Church in the world proceeds through the contribution of those who are a part of it,” he said, noting in off-the-cuff comments that when it comes to how the Church is understood, “some think that there are only bishops, the bosses, and then there are the workers.”

“No, the Church is all of us, everyone, each person has their role in the Church, but we are all the Church,” he said, adding that “we must think of the Church as a living organism, composed of people who we know and with whom we walk, and not as an abstract and distant reality.”

“The Church is us who walk, us who are here in the square. It’s everyone,” he said.

Pope Francis spoke to pilgrims in St. Peter’s Square for his weekly audience address, which is currently dedicated to a series of catechesis on the sacrament of Confirmation.

The gift of the Holy Spirit, he said, helps candidates mature in the faith and allows them to in turn become a gift for others.

“It is precisely the Holy Spirit who de-centers us from our ‘I’ in order to open ourselves to the ‘we’ of the Christian community, as well as to the society in which we live,” he said, adding that the soul is not a “warehouse,” and that as Christians, “we are not the center, we are an instrument to give to others.”

Confirmation is linked to the universal Church and actively involves candidates in the life of the local Churches where they come from, he said, and since the bishop is the head of the local Church, this is why he is the ordinary minister of the sacrament.

This incorporation of the candidate into the Church, he said, is signified by the sign of the peace which takes place at the end of the rite of Confirmation, when the bishop says “peace be with you.”

When a candidate receives this sign of peace from the bishop, it commits them to working for greater communion “inside and outside of the Church, with enthusiasm and without being paralyzed by resistance.”

“To receive peace means committing to work toward improving harmony in the parish, encouraging understanding with others, including, rather than discarding or marginalizing.” It also means being able to recognize and appreciate differences, because “the Holy Spirit is creative and not repetitive. His gifts arouse a symphony and not monotony!”

Pope Francis then challenged the crowd to think of their own parish community and how they act after giving and receiving the sign of peace during Mass.

While the sign of peace is symbolic of the harmony and charity that ought to guide members of the Church, the pope noted that many times when people leave Mass “we start to gossip. And gossip is war against others.”

“If we have received peace, we must give it to others,” he said, stressing that “gossip is not a work of the Holy Spirit…please don’t gossip.”

Francis closed his address reiterating that Confirmation is a gift meant not only for the recipient, but also for the spiritual good of others.

Only by “opening ourselves and going out of ourselves to encounter our brothers can we truly grow and not just fool ourselves,” he said, adding that when Catholics receive the Holy Spirit, “it must in fact be given so that it bears fruit and is not buried because of our selfish fears.”

Quoting his exhortation on holiness Gaudete et Exsultate, the pope said Catholics need to be prompted by the Holy Spirit, “lest we be paralyzed by fear and excessive caution, lest we grow used to keeping within safe bounds.”

“Let us remember that closed spaces grow musty and unhealthy,” he said, and urged Confirmation candidates not to “cage the Holy Spirit” by resisting his inspiration or suffocating “the burning fire of charity which consumes his life for God and for others.”

“May the Holy Spirit grant each of us the apostolic courage of communicating the Gospel, with words and works, to all those we meet on our path.”

[…]

Vatican City, Apr 24, 2017 / 11:28 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis will make a pilgrimage June 20 to visit the graves of two 20th century Italian priests in the towns of Bozzolo and Bariana, the Vatican announced Monday.

Fr. Lorenzo Milani and Fr. Primo Mazzolari both have reputations for being anti-establishment, though they were obedient to the Church throughout their lives. The Pope’s visit to their graves will take place in a “private and unofficial manner,” the April 24 communique stated.

The pilgrimage takes place in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the death of Fr. Milani, who lived from 1923-1967. Pope Francis spoke about Fr. Milani in a video message to the participants of a presentation on the priest’s complete works in Milan Sunday.

“I would love to remember him especially as a believer, in love with the Church even though he was wounded,” the Pope said in the message April 23, “and as a passionate educator with a vision of the school that seems to me to respond to the need of the hearts and the intelligence of our children and youth.”

Pope Francis’ brief visit – only half a day – will begin with an early morning helicopter flight to Bozzolo June 20, landing at 9:00 a.m. He will be welcomed by the Mayor of Bozzolo and the Bishop of Cremona, Antonio Napolioni.

From there the Pope will proceed to the parish of St. Peter to pray at the tomb of Fr. Primo Mazzolari, after which he will give a commemorative speech to the faithful present at the church.

At 10:30 a.m. he will leave for Barbiana, arriving at the Barbiana church at 11:15 a.m. He will be welcomed there by Cardinal Giuseppe Betori, Archbishop of Florence and the Mayor of Vicchio, a municipality of Florence.

He will then visit privately the cemetery of the church to pray at the grave of Fr. Lorenzo Milani. Afterwards, Pope Francis will meet in the church with still-living disciples of Fr. Milani.

After a short visit to the rectory in the adjacent garden he will give a speech in the presence of around 200 people, including the disciples, priests of the diocese and some children living in family homes in the area. The Pope will return to the Vatican by about 1:15 p.m.

Fr. Milani came from a wealthy but secular family, the son of an atheist father and a Jewish mother. He studied art, which had a profound influence on his conversion to Catholicism and eventual entrance into the priesthood in 1947.

His “frankness that sometimes seemed too rough when not marked by rebellion” carried over even into his priesthood, Pope Francis noted in his video message. This led to some friction and misunderstandings with ecclesiastical and civil structures “because of his educational proposal, his preference for the poor, and defense of conscientious objection.”

Despite this, however, he was always deeply obedient to the Church and to her directives. He once wrote: “I will never oppose the Church because I need (her) several times a week for the forgiveness of my sins, and I would not know to whom else to go to look for it if I had left the Church.”

Fr. Primo Mazzolari lived from 1890-1959. He grew up in a small neighborhood of the town of Cremona, Italy, entering the seminary in 1902. Some have called him a “priest of the embankment,” because he grew up on the banks of the Po River and also at the “embankment” of the Church.

Very politically active, he intervened in the First World War and after, and was so anti-fascist he refused to sing the “Te Deum” after a failed attack on Mussolini by Tito Zaniboni in 1925.

His greatness already recognized, he was invited to the Vatican by both Pope John XXIII and Pope Paul VI before his death. In 2015 permission was formally granted to open the diocesan phase of Fr. Mazzolari’s cause for beatification.
 
Andrea Gagliarducci contributed to this report.

[…]

CNA Staff, Jun 5, 2020 / 02:21 pm (CNA).- The Holy See press office announced Friday that Italian businessman Gianluigi Torzi has been arrested after he was interrogated as part of a Vatican financial investigation.

Torzi played a crucial role in the … […]