With our Morning Prayers, at the beginning of this day during which we shall continue to reflect on the subject: "Priests, the shapers of saints for the new millennium", Jesus’ word echoes with renewed urgency in each of us, assembled here in his name: "So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Mt 5,48). This is not only an auspice or the Master’s advice, but rather a pressing vocation and a commitment. It is the answer for living in a radical manner and also generously the commitment of our ‘yes’ spoken to our vocation to priesthood.

Our meditation is a contribution to today’s thoughts, enlightened by the priest’s vocation to Eucharistic sanctity, a vocation inspired by the Virgin Mary’s answer.

We are now at the beginning of the third millennium and the Church must face a challenge in which none of us may escape their responsibility: to act as witnesses of sanctity to become shapers of saints.

The brief passage from the prophet Isaiah 66,1-2 we have just proclaimed, provides us with an image of God, but that of a God who reveals Himself to us: on one hand he tells us He placed His throne in the high heavens and the earth is the stool at his feet; on the other He is a God who takes delight in the simple, looking at the humble and is moved by the suffering of those who eat their fill of his Word.

The 21^st century man looks to God, at times unwittingly searching for him, at times embarking on the wrong path, but there is at least one thing we are sure of: his hunger and his need to fill his empty heart. This same man turns to we who are priests and asks us to reflect He who we believe in and to be transparent to His sanctity.

The prophet Isaiah emphasises that, rather than building temples, places for the divinity to rest in, we should mould the heart, fill it with sanctity (above all our own), to then sanctify the hearts of those who turn their eyes towards us.

There are two thoughts that can enlighten our thoughts this morning, on one hand there is the often quoted passage from K. Rahner: "The 21^st century Christian will be a mystic or he will not be a Christian", and on the other, the words of St. John of the Cross: "One should know that if the soul searches for God, his Beloved searches for the soul a great deal more" (LI 3,28).

These two thoughts above all suggest that:

What place does God occupy in our lives as priests? This may seem to be an absurd question, but in fact it is not. We see this everyday. If we speak of priestly sanctity as a need, we cannot think of an abstract reality without discovering our image of God. An answer to this question becomes essential if we wish to reach today’s man.

In fact, today’s man aspires to experiencing God. Priests and all those consecrated are called upon to manifest and show the world the God we have personally encountered and experienced. Mystics tell us that encountering God, hearing God, is possible; these are witnesses worthy of the faith. They do not speak of a certain desire, it is necessary to have a passion for God to be able to meet Him. John of the Cross said: "This Christ must after all cost something" and in the Cantico he exclaimed: "Oh souls created for this greatness and these calls! What are you doing! What is holding you back! Your excuses are cowardly and your possessions trifles. Oh pitiful blindness in the eyes of your souls, since you are blind to such light and deaf to such a strong voice" (CB 39,7).

What are we called to? No less to converse with God, to be saints, called upon to a divine vocation. Sanctity is not something to be bought at any price in the new temples of consumerism.

I now wish to briefly outline the three indispensable dimensions for all priestly spirituality and hence for shaping priests who are saints.

We know what we have experienced: words arise from knowledge and we know that the word is what gives us security.

To meet God it is necessary to experience interiorisation, because He is a hidden God, although the whole creation is a manifestation of His passage. It is only in the profoundness of the mystery that we can catch a glimpse of His being; as St. Augustine said: "If you understand Him, if you prove His existence, He is no longer God". Not even his traces are God, we must address matters more deeply, it is a whole in-depth process so as not to trivialize God. Teresa of Jesus used to say that "The gateway is prayer".

It is important to remember that prayer does not change God’s heart (He knows us extremely well): prayer changes the hearts of humankind, it makes us more open for accepting His plan within ourselves. Prayer is a means for becoming a mystic, a contemplative person, ultimately a saint.

The question is always the same one: what is prayer? How does one become a man of prayer? It is the description of a story that puts us in communication with God, the scream resulting from a wounded heart, it means coming into contact with someone who answers us when times are happy, monotonous or desperate.

I remember the famous description by Teresa of Jesus: "To speak of friendship, while often remaining alone with He who we know loves us" (V 8.5).

The Holy Father told us in his Apostolic Letter Novo Millennio Ineunte: "Our Christian communities must become genuine "schools" of prayer, where the meeting with Christ is expressed not just in imploring help but also in thanksgiving, praise, adoration, contemplation, listening and ardent devotion, until the heart truly "falls in love"" (NMI 33). If this concerns all Christians, it is even more important for we who are priests. Prayer not as an escape, but rather as a journey for learning about God’s sanctity.

Personalistic processes are always dangerous. A Christian on his own, without a community, is always dangerous, or he is only half a Christian. A priests and animators for the community we must be convinced of this fact: any process of faith must be experienced and compared within the community.

It is not only an emotional and spiritual communion, but must become concrete in real facts, be in syntony, finding time for sharing. This implies dialogue, reciprocal knowledge, forgiveness and celebration, commitment and work for establishing the Kingdom.

The Eucharist is the epitome of all communion, "Source and summit of the church’s life and mission", a subject that will be discussed in-depth today and will prepare us for the next Synod of Bishops.

A spirituality of closeness, "being with", "being amidst"...

Being with and amidst God’s people, sharing those joys and hopes mentioned in the Gaudium et Spes. It is the privileged place in which our spirituality is nourished; we are not officials for the people but instead "is taken from among men and made their representative before God" (Heb 5,1).

As Jesus did, we must make a choice for the most poor and needy, an "emotional and effective option". This is also the need expressed by the prophet Isaiah in the reading we have just heard: "This is the one whom I approve: the lowly and afflicted man who trembles at my word." (Is 66,2).

Living a testimony of simplicity, this means allowing oneself to be seen by the people, leading a transparent life, to be transparent with Christ. "Unless you turn and become like children, ³ you will not enter the kingdom of heaven" (Mt 18,3). This means a new lifestyle for a new way of being a Church.

My brother priests, do not be afraid to be saints. The Holy Father has said this at every opportunity during his pontificate, he repeated it to the young, at marriages and, above all, he has born witness to the sanctity of many of our brothers he has made Saints. And today he also repeats this to each of us: Do not be afraid to be saints! Amen.