The Holy Father closed the cycle of catecheses on old age with the theme: “The pains of creation. The history of creation as a mystery of gestation.”
Newsroom (24/08/2022 1:22 PM Gaudium Press) At the General Audience on Wednesday 24th, held in the Paul VI Hall, Pope Francis concluded the cycle of catecheses on old age. Today’s theme was: “The labour pains of creation. The story of the creature as a mystery of gestation.”
Taking advantage of the Solemnity of the Assumption of Our Lady, the Pontiff began his meditation by emphasizing that in the ascent in body and soul to heaven of the Virgin Mary and also in the Ascension of the Lord “the destiny of the resurrection that pertains to us is anticipated: because, according to Christian faith, the Risen One is the firstborn of many brothers and sisters.”
Our destiny is to rise
The first to rise was our Lord Jesus Christ, and soon it will be us, for our destiny is to rise again. As Jesus said to Nicodemus, it is like being born again, “If the first was a birth on earth, the second is a birth in heaven.”
“The risen Jesus with his body lives in the Trinitarian intimacy of God! And in it he does not lose his memory, he does not abandon his history, he does not dissolve the relationships he lived on earth,” the Pope said. “And he will come, not only will he come at the end for everyone, he will come each time for each one of us. He will come to seek us out to bring us to him. In this sense, death is a kind of step toward the encounter with Jesus who is waiting for me to bring me to him,“ he assured.
“The Risen One lives in God’s world, where there is a place for everyone, where a new earth is being formed, and the heavenly city, man’s final dwelling place, is being built. We cannot imagine this transfiguration of our mortal corporality, but we are certain that it will keep our faces recognizable and allow us to remain human in God’s heaven. It will allow us to participate, with sublime emotion, in the infinite and blissful exuberance of God’s creative act, whose endless adventures we will experience first-hand,” Francis said.
Wisdom of old age
The Pope referred to the elderly as his co-ethnics, for whom small details such as “a caress, a smile, a gesture, an appreciated effort, an unexpected surprise, a hospitable cheerfulness, a faithful bond — becomes more acute.”
“The essentials of life, which are dearest to us as we approach our farewell, become definitively clear to us. This wisdom of old age is the place of our gestation, which illumines the life of children, of young people, of adults, of the whole community. Our whole life is like a seed that must be buried so that its flower and fruit may be born,” he concluded. (EPC)
Compiled by Gustavo Kralj