On 27 February 2013, His
Holiness Pope Benedict XVI celebrated his last general audience. In St. Peter's
Square, crowded with tens of thousands of people wishing to bid him farewell,
the Pontiff said:
“I feel that I am
carrying everyone with me in prayer in this God-given moment when I am
collecting every meeting, every trip, every pastoral visit. I am gathering
everyone and everything in prayer to entrust it to the Lord: so that we may be
filled with the knowledge of His will through all spiritual wisdom and
understanding in order to live in a manner worthy of the Lord and His love,
bearing fruit in every good work (cf. Col 1:9-10).”
“At this moment I
have great confidence because I know, we all know, that the Gospel's Word of
truth is the strength of the Church; it is her life. The Gospel purifies and
renews, bearing fruit, wherever the community of believers hears it and
welcomes God's grace in truth and in love. This is my confidence, this is my
joy.”
“When, on 19 April
almost eight years ago I accepted to take on the Petrine ministry, I had the
firm certainty that has always accompanied me: this certainty for the life of
the Church from the Word of God. At that moment, as I have already expressed
many times, the words that resounded in my heart were: Lord, what do You ask of
me? It is a great weight that You are placing on my shoulders but, if You ask
it of me, I will cast my nets at your command, confident that You will guide
me, even with all my weaknesses. And eight years later I can say that the Lord
has guided me. He has been close to me. I have felt His presence every day. It
has been a stretch of the Church's path that has had moments of joy and light,
but also difficult moments. I felt like St. Peter and the Apostles in the boat
on the Sea of Galilee. The Lord has given us many days of sunshine and light
breezes, days when the fishing was plentiful, but also times when the water was
rough and the winds against us, just as throughout the whole history of the
Church, when the Lord seemed to be sleeping. But I always knew that the Lord is
in that boat and I always knew that the boat of the Church is not mine, not
ours, but is His. And the Lord will not let it sink. He is the one who steers
her, of course also through those He has chosen because that is how He wanted
it. This was and is a certainty that nothing can tarnish. And that is why my
heart today is filled with gratitude to God, because He never left—the whole
Church or me—without His consolation, His light, or His love.”
“We are in the Year
of Faith, which I desired precisely in order to strengthen our faith in God in
a context that seems to relegate it more and more to the background. I would
like to invite everyone to renew their firm trust in the Lord, to entrust ourselves
like children to God's arms, certain that those arms always hold us up and are
what allow us to walk forward each day, even when it is a struggle. I would
like everyone to feel beloved of that God who gave His Son for us and who has
shown us His boundless love. I would like everyone to feel the joy of being
Christian. In a beautiful prayer, which can be recited every morning, say: 'I
adore you, my God and I love you with all my heart. Thank you for having
created me, for having made me Christian...' Yes, we are happy for the gift of
faith. It is the most precious thing, which no one can take from us! Let us
thank the Lord for this every day, with prayer and with a coherent Christian
life. God loves us, but awaits us to also love Him!”
“I also thank each
and every one of you for the respect and understanding with which you have
received this important decision. I will continue to accompany the Church's
journey through prayer and reflection, with the dedication to the Lord and His
Bride that I have tried to live every day up to now and that I want to always
live. I ask you to remember me to God, and above all to pray for the Cardinals
who are called to such an important task, and for the new Successor of the
Apostle Peter. Many the Lord accompany him with the light and strength of His
Spirit.”
“We call upon the
maternal intercession of Mary, the Mother of God and of the Church, that she
might accompany each of us and the entire ecclesial community. We entrust
ourselves to her with deep confidence.”
“Dear friends! God
guides His Church, always sustaining her even and especially in difficult
times. Let us never lose this vision of faith, which is the only true vision of
the path of the Church and of the world. In our hearts, in the heart of each
one of you, may there always be the joyous certainty that the Lord is beside
us, that He does not abandon us, that He is near and embraces us with His love.
Thank you.”
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