https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/homilies/2013/documents/papa-francesco_20130423_omelia-san-giorgio.html
(Retrieved on January 19, 2022; Full Text)
EUCHARISTIC CONCELEBRATION
WITH THE EMINENT CARDINALS RESIDENT IN ROME
ON THE OCCASION OF THE FEAST OF SAINT GEORGE
HOMILY OF POPE FRANCIS
Pauline Chapel (1)
Tuesday, 23 April 2013
Photo Gallery (2)
I thank His Eminence, the Cardinal Dean, for his words: Thank you, Your
Eminence, many thanks.
I also thank those of you who came today. Thank you! Because I feel
warmly welcomed by you. Thank you! I feel at home with you, and that
pleases me.
Today’s first reading makes me think that, at the very moment when
persecution broke out, the Church’s missionary nature also "broke out".
These Christians went all the way to Phoenicia, Cyprus and Antioch, and
proclaimed the Word (cf. Acts 11:19). They had this apostolic fervor in
their hearts; and so the faith spread! Some people from Cyprus and
Cyrene, not these but others who had become Christians, came to Antioch
and began to speak also to the Greeks (cf. Acts 11:20). This is yet
another step. And so the Church moves forward. Who took this initiative
of speaking to the Greeks, something unheard of, since they were
preaching only to Jews? It was the Holy Spirit, the one who was pushing
them on, on and on, unceasingly.
But back in Jerusalem, when somebody heard about this, he got a little
nervous and they sent a Apostolic Visitation: they sent Barnabas (cf.
Acts 11:22). Perhaps, with a touch of humor, we can say that this was
the theological origin of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the
Faith: this Apostolic Visitation of Barnabas. He took a look and saw
that things were going well (cf. Acts 11:23). And in this way the
Church is increasingly a Mother, a Mother of many, many children: she
becomes a Mother, ever more fully a Mother, a Mother who gives us
faith, a Mother who gives us our identity. But Christian identity is
not an identity card. Christian identity means being a member of the
Church, since all these people belonged to the Church, to Mother Church, for apart from the
Church it is not possible to find Jesus. The great Paul VI said: it is
an absurd dichotomy to wish to live with Jesus but without the Church,
to follow Jesus but without the Church, to love Jesus but without the
Church (cf. Evangelii Nuntiandi, 16). And that Mother Church who gives us Jesus
also gives us an identity which is not simply a rubber stamp: it is
membership. Identity means membership, belonging. Belonging to the
Church: this is beautiful!
The third idea which comes to my mind – the first was the outbreak of
the Church’s missionary nature, and second, the Church as Mother – is
that, when Barnabas saw that crowd – the text says: "and a great many
people were brought to the Lord" (Acts 11:24) – when he saw that crowd,
he rejoiced. "When he came and saw the grace of God, he rejoiced" (Acts
11:23). It is the special joy of the evangelizer. It is, as Paul VI
said, "the delightful and comforting joy of evangelizing" (cf.
Evangelii Nuntiandi, 80). This joy begins with persecution, with great
sadness, and ends in joy. And so the Church moves forward, as a Saint
tells us, amid the persecutions of the world and the consolations of
the Lord (cf. Saint Augustine, De Civitate Dei, 18:51,2: PL 41, 614).
This is the life of the Church. If we want to take the path of
worldliness, bargaining with the world – as the Maccabeans were tempted
to do back then – we will never have the consolation of the Lord. And
if we seek consolation alone, it will be a superficial consolation, not
the Lord’s consolation, but a human consolation. The Church always
advances between the cross and the resurrection, between persecutions
and the consolations of the Lord. This is the path: those who take this
path do not go wrong.
Today let us think about the missionary nature of the Church: these
disciples who took the initiative to go forth, and those who had the
courage to proclaim Jesus to the Greeks, something which at that time
was almost scandalous (cf. Acts 11:19-20). Let us think of Mother Church, who is increasing,
growing with new children to whom she gives the identity of faith, for
one cannot believe in Jesus without the Church. Jesus himself says so
in the Gospel: but you do not believe because you do not belong to my
sheep (cf. Jn 10:26). Unless we are "Jesus’ sheep", faith does not
come; it is a faith which is watered down, insubstantial. And let us
think of the consolation which Barnabas experienced, which was
precisely the "delightful and comforting joy of evangelizing". Let us
ask the Lord for this parrhesia, this apostolic fervour which impels us
to move forward, as brothers and sisters, all of us: forward! Forward,
bearing the name of Jesus in the bosom of holy Mother Church, as Saint Ignatius
said, hierarchical and Catholic. Amen.
