BENEDICT XVI
GENERAL
AUDIENCE
Saint Peter's Square
Wednesday, 24 June 2009
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Last Friday, 19 June, the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and a Day
traditionally dedicated to prayer for the sanctification of priests, I had the
joy of inaugurating the Year for Priests which I established on the occasion of
the 150th anniversary of the "birth in Heaven" of the Curé d'Ars, St
John Baptist Mary Vianney. And on entering the Vatican Basilica for the
celebration of Vespers, first by way of a symbolic gesture I paused in the
Chapel of the Choir to venerate the relic of this holy pastor of souls: his
heart. Why a Year for Priests? Why precisely in memory
of the Holy Curé d'Ars who did not, apparently, achieve anything extraordinary?
Divine Providence has ensured
that his figure be juxtaposed with that of St Paul. Indeed, while the Pauline
Year, dedicated to the Apostle to the Gentiles an extraordinary evangelizer who
made several missionary voyages in order to spread the Gospel is drawing to a
close, this new Jubilee Year invites us to look at a poor peasant who became a
humble parish priest and carried out his pastoral service in a small village.
If the two saints differ widely because of the paths through life that
characterized them one went from one region to the next to proclaim the Gospel,
the other welcomed thousands and thousands of the faithful while remaining in
his own tiny parish some basic factor binds them together nevertheless; and it
is their total identification with their own ministry, their communion with
Christ, which made St Paul say "I have been crucified with Christ; it is
no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me" (Gal 2: 20).
And St John Mary Vianney used to like to repeat: "if we had faith, we
would see God hidden in the priest like a light behind glass or like wine mixed
with water". The purpose of this Year for Priests, as I wrote in my Letter addressed to priests for this occasion,
is therefore to encourage every priest in this striving for spiritual
perfection on which, above all, the effectiveness of their ministry depends,
and first and foremost to help priests and with them the entire People of God
to rediscover and to reinforce their knowledge of the extraordinary,
indispensable gift of Grace which the ordained minister represents for those
who have received it, for the whole Church and for the world which would be
lost without the Real Presence of Christ.
There is no doubt that the
historical and social conditions in which the Curé d'Ars lived have changed and
it is right to wonder how priests in today's globalized societies can imitate
him by identifying with him in their own ministries. In a world in which the
common vision of life includes less and less of the sacred, instead of which
"functionality" becomes the only crucial element, the Catholic
concept of the priesthood might risk losing its natural esteem, at times even
within the ecclesial conscience. Two different conceptions of the priesthood
are frequently compared and at times even set against one another, in
theological milieus as well as in actual pastoral practice and the formation of
the clergy. In this regard I pointed out several years ago that there is:
"on the one hand a social and functional concept that defines the essence
of the priesthood with the concept of "service': service to the community
in the fulfilment of a function.... Moreover, there is the
sacramental-ontological concept, which of course does not deny the priesthood's
character of service but sees it anchored to the minister's existence and
claims that this existence is determined by a gift granted by the Lord through
the mediation of the Church, whose name is sacrament" (J. Ratzinger, Ministero
e vita del Sacerdote, in Elementi di Teologia fondamentale. Saggio su fede e
ministero, Brescia 2005, p. 165). The terminological shifting of the word
"priesthood" to "service, ministry, assignment", is also a
sign of this different conception. The primacy of the Eucharist, moreover, is
linked to the former, the ontological-sacramental conception, in the dual term:
"priesthood-sacrifice", whereas the primacy of the word and of the
service of proclamation is held to correspond with the latter.
Clearly these two concepts are
not contradictory and the tension which nevertheless exists between them may be
resolved from within. Thus the Decree of the Second Vatican Council on the Ministry and
Life of Priests, Presbyterorum ordinis, says: "For,
through the apostolic proclamation of the Gospel, the People of God is called
together and assembled so that when all who belong to this People have been
sanctified by the Holy Spirit, they can offer themselves as "a sacrifice,
living, holy, pleasing to God' (Rm 12: 1).
Through the ministry of priests the spiritual sacrifice of the faithful is made
perfect in union with the sacrifice of Christ, the sole Mediator. Through the
hands of priests and in the name of the whole Church, the Lord's sacrifice is
offered in the Eucharist in an unbloody and sacramental manner until he himself
returns" (n. 2).
Then let us ask ourselves:
"What precisely does "to evangelize' mean for priests? What does the
"primacy' of proclamation consist in?". Jesus speaks of the
proclamation of the Kingdom of God as the true purpose of his coming into the
world and his proclamation is not only a "discourse". At the same
time it includes his action: the signs and miracles that he works show that the
Kingdom comes into the world as a present reality which ultimately coincides
with Jesus himself. In this sense it is only right to recall that even in the
primacy of proclamation, the word and the sign are indivisible. Christian
preaching does not proclaim "words", but the Word, and the
proclamation coincides with the very Person of Christ, ontologically open to
the relationship with the Father and obedient to his will. Thus, an authentic
service to the Word requires of the priest that he strive for deeper
self-denial, to the point that he can say, with the Apostle, "it is no
longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me". The priest cannot consider
himself "master" of the Word, but its servant. He is not the Word
but, as John the Baptist, whose birth we are celebrating precisely today,
proclaimed, he is the "voice" of the Word: "the voice of one
crying in the wilderness: Prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths
straight" (Mk 1: 3).
For the priest, then, being
the "voice" of the Word is not merely a functional aspect. On the
contrary, it implies a substantial "losing of himself" in Christ, participating
with his whole being in the mystery of Christ's death and Resurrection: his
understanding, his freedom, his will and the offering of his body as a living
sacrifice (cf. Rm 12: 1-2).
Only participation in Christ's sacrifice, in his kenosis, makes preaching
authentic! And this is the way he must take with Christ to reach the point of
being able to say to the Father, together with Christ: let "not what I
will, but what you will" be done (Mk 14: 36).
Proclamation, therefore, always involves self-sacrifice, a prerequisite for its
authenticity and efficacy.
As an alter Christus,
the priest is profoundly united to the Word of the Father who, in becoming
incarnate took the form of a servant, he became a servant (Phil 2: 5-11).
The priest is a servant of Christ, in the sense that his existence, configured
to Christ ontologically, acquires an essentially relational character: he is in
Christ, for Christ and with Christ, at the service of humankind.
Because he belongs to Christ, the priest is radically at the service of all
people: he is the minister of their salvation, their happiness and their
authentic liberation, developing, in this gradual assumption of Christ's will,
in prayer, in "being heart to heart" with him. Therefore this is the
indispensable condition for every proclamation, which entails participation in
the sacramental offering of the Eucharist and docile obedience to the Church.
The saintly Curé d'Ars would
often say with tears in his eyes: "How dreadful it is to be a
priest!". And he would add: "How a priest who celebrates Mass like an
ordinary event is to be pitied! How unfortunate is a priest with no inner
life!". May the Year for Priests lead all priests to
identify totally with the Crucified and Risen Jesus so that, in imitation of St
John the Baptist, they may be prepared to "shrink" that Christ may
grow and that, in following the example of the Curé d'Ars, they feel constantly
and profoundly the responsibility of their mission, which is the sign and
presence of God's infinite mercy. Let us entrust to Our Lady, Mother of the
Church, the Year for Priests which has just begun and all the priests of the
world.
* * *
To special groups
Dear Brothers and Sisters, I
offer a warm welcome to the English-speaking visitors present at today's Audience,
especially those from Norway, Sweden, Malawi, South Africa, Indonesia and the
United States. My particular greeting goes to the Catholic educators
participating in the annual Rome Seminar sponsored by the Lay Centre at Foyer
Unitas. I also greet the many student groups present. Upon all of you I invoke
God's blessings of joy and peace!
Lastly, I greet the young
people, the sick and the newlyweds. Today we are celebrating the
Feast of the birth of St John the Baptist, sent by God to bear witness to the
light and to prepare a people well disposed to the Lord. I hope that you, dear young
people, may find in friendship with Jesus the necessary strength always to
be equal to the responsibilities that await you. I urge you, dear sick people,
to consider your suffering and daily trials as an opportunity that God offers
you to cooperate in the salvation of souls. And I ask you, dear newlyweds,
to express the Lord's love in reciprocal faithfulness and in generous openness
to life.
I now address a cordial welcome
to the Delegation led by the Undersecretary of the United Nations Organization
and Special Representative of the Secretary General for Children and Armed
Conflict. In expressing to you and to those who accompany you my deep
appreciation of your work in defence of children, the victims of violence and
weapons, I am thinking of all the world's children, especially those exposed to
fear, neglect, hunger, abuse, illness and death. The Pope is close to all these
small victims and always remembers them in his prayers.
On 24 June 150 years ago the
idea was conceived of a far-reaching mobilization in aid of war victims, which
was subsequently to acquire the name of the "Red Cross". As the years
have passed, the values of universality, neutrality and independence in service
have inspired the adherence of millions of volunteers in every part of the
world, forming an important bulwark of humanity and solidarity in numerous
contexts of war and conflict, as well as in many emergencies. In expressing the
hope that the human person, in his dignity and in all his dimensions may always
be the centre of the humanitarian work of the Red Cross, I encourage young
people especially to undertake practical work in this praiseworthy institution.
I make the most of this opportunity
to request the release of all those who have been kidnapped in war zones and
ask once again for the liberation of Eugenio Vagni, a Red Cross worker in the
Philippines.
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