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Skriven 2007-01-08 22:33:34 av Marc Lewis (1:396/45)
Ärende: Vatican Information Service - Press Release
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                               VIS-Press releases

DO NOT BE AFRAID OF CHRIST AND OF HIS MESSAGE!

VATICAN CITY, JAN 6, 2007 (VIS) - In the Vatican Basilica at 10 a.m. today, the
Pope presided at Mass for the Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord.

In his homily, the Holy Father affirmed that the Epiphany is "the
'manifestation' of Christ to peoples," who "are represented by the Magi, the
mysterious pilgrims from the East. We celebrate Christ, the goal of peoples'
pilgrimage in search of salvation".

"Who," the Pope asked, "are the Magi today? How, our minds upon the modern
world, can we interpret these mysterious gospel figures?" To answer this
question, he considered Vatican Council II which, he said, was moved "by the
desire to announce Christ, light of the world, to modern humanity," and which
identified "the need to create a new political and economic world order, and at
the same time and above all a spiritual and cultural order, in other words a
renewed humanism."

At the beginning of the third millenium, characterized by the phenomenon of
globalization, said the Holy Father, there is a risk of losing sight of this
challenge, "a risk greatly reinforced by the immense growth of the mass media
which, although on the one hand they immeasurably increase our sources of
information, on the other they seem to weaken our capacity to achieve a
critical overview."

Recalling the final messages of Vatican Council II, the Pope indicated that the
first was addressed to rulers and the second to men of thought and science,
"two categories of people," he said, "that in some way correspond to the gospel
figures of the Magi." To them, he went on, "it is today more than ever
necessary to add the representatives of the great non-Christian religious
traditions, inviting them to contemplate the light of Christ, Who came not to
abolish but to bring to fruition what the hand of God had written in the
religious history of civilizations, especially in the 'great souls' who
contributed to building humanity with their wisdom and their exemplary virtue.
Christ is light, and light cannot obscure but only illuminate, clarify and
reveal.

"Therefore," he concluded, "let no one be afraid of Christ and of His message!
And if in the course of history Christians, being imperfect and sinful, have
sometimes betrayed Him with their behavior, this highlights even more the fact
that the light is Christ, and the Church reflects that light only by remaining
united to Him."
HML/EPIPHANY/...VIS 070108 (420)

SUMMARY

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