Quote of the Day

"Restlessness is the sign that our heart does not move by chance, in a disordered way, without a purpose or a destination, but is oriented towards its ultimate destination, the 'return home'. The authentic approach of the heart does not consist in possessing the goods of this world, but in achieving what can fill it completely; namely, the love of God, or rather, God who is Love. This treasure, however, can only be found by loving the neighbor we meet along the way: brothers and sisters in flesh and blood, whose presence stirs and questions our heart, calling it to open up and give itself. Our neighbor asks us to slow down, to look them in the eye, sometimes to change our plans, perhaps even to change direction."

--Pope Leo XIV, General Audience, December 17, 2025

Quote of the Day

“Remind us of Your gentle goodwill, O Lord. May we never be severe or harsh. May we see in everyone, a child whom You have created and redeemed with the most precious blood of Your Son. Teach us to know that You value kindness, that love is the best way to attract people to You. May we always help others to taste and see the sweetness and gentleness of Your love."

--Saint Junipero Serra

Quote of the Day

"One can know the whole Bible, one can know all the liturgical rubrics, one can know all the theology, but from knowing, loving is not automatic: loving has another way, intelligence is needed but also something more… True worship does not exist if it is not translated into service to one’s neighbor."

--Pope Francis, General Audience, April 27, 2016

Reflections on the Past Twenty Years

by Justin Soutar

I wish all readers of this blog post a Happy New Year 2020 and a happy new decade as well. It's hard to believe we've just entered the "Twenties," since my maternal grandparents were born in the 1920s almost one hundred years ago. This milestone is a good time to pause and reflect on the direction of the Church, our country and our world during the first twenty years of the twenty-first century.

From the Jubilee Year 2000 to 2019, the Catholic Church generally prospered under the courageous leadership of three saintly Popes: Saint John Paul II "the Great", Benedict XVI and Francis. Despite major differences in personality, style, and emphasis arising from their different backgrounds and training, there has been a great continuity among the Polish, German, and Argentinian pontiffs in their unwavering focus on Christ and His Gospel; the clarity of their teaching on the essential doctrines of the Faith; and their efforts toward administrative and spiritual reform of the Roman Curia and the Church generally.

While disturbing revelations of sexual abuse of children and youth by some Catholic priests and cover-up by a few bishops in the second half of the twentieth century cast a shadow over the Church throughout the world, these same revelations led to the establishment of new Church policies and structures that contributed to a drastic reduction in abuse incidents in the U.S. during this period. Additionally, during the late 2010s, dissident pressure groups and the secular media ignited an unfortunate controversy within the Church in the U.S. and elsewhere over the meaning and application of certain passages in Pope Francis' beautiful apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia (The Joy of Love), leading millions of faithful Catholics to erroneously believe that Francis wants to change the Church's moral teachings or is unfit for office.

Despite these problems, the Church overall has been thriving. In the U.S., the majority of bishops have been saintly men and nearly all have remained faithful to the Magisterium. We saw the beginning of the end of the chronic priest shortage as orthodox seminaries across America were packed with increasing numbers of holy young men each year and the number of priestly ordinations began to steadily increase. Faithful religious women such as the Nashville Dominicans also grew substantially in number. The number of lay faithful has continued to grow with each Easter Vigil. EWTN expanded its media apostolate by acquiring the National Catholic Register in 2011 and adding tens of millions of new radio listeners and TV viewers. Worldwide, the Church added about 300 million new members during the past twenty years, the majority of them in Africa.

Our country enjoyed an economic boom from 2000 to 2007 during the Bush administration which was followed by the stock market crash of 2008 and resulting Great Recession which was prolonged by the Obama administration's high taxes and increased government regulation of businesses. Lower taxes and less regulation contributed to economic growth and historically low unemployment during the first three years of the Trump administration. While the standard of living generally increased with nearly every American enjoying Internet access, a cell phone and flat screen TV, corporate greed and the failure of wages to keep pace with cost of living increases contributed to the dismemberment of the middle class, and the national debt swelled from $2 trillion to $20 trillion.

The growth of major corporations such as Dollar General, Wal-Mart, Lowe's and The Home Depot forced tens of thousands of small businesses to close by flooding the U.S. market with cheap goods imported from China and other foreign countries. However, a popular movement to support American manufacturers by buying American made products had gained steam by the end of the 2010s, with President Trump replacing NAFTA with USMCA to discourage the outsourcing of American manufacturing. And fueled by growing demand, the organic food and renewable energy industries saw significant growth during the past two decades.

Politically, our country has grown more and more divided from the contested presidential election of 2000 to the futile attempt by House Democrats to impeach President Trump in late 2019. Corrupt Republican and Democratic members of Congress have proven incapable of bipartisan collaboration on a host of pressing issues from abortion and religious freedom to healthcare and the environment to immigration and foreign policy. Unable or unwilling to peaceably discuss and work with their colleagues across the aisle, they've resorted to scoring whatever legislative or judicial victories they can scrape for their own side and either violently attacking or quietly distancing themselves from the opposition. Millions of frustrated Americans espousing traditional Judeo-Christian values created the Tea Party movement within the Republican Party in 2009, many of whose candidates were swept into state and national office in the gubernatorial, senatorial and Congressional elections of 2010 and 2014.

Religiously and morally, our country has become increasingly less Christian under the pervasive influence of militant secularism. Christians are still a large majority of the population, but their percentage has gradually declined while the percentage of nonreligious individuals has grown into double digits and Satanism and the occult have become more popular. In 2000, freedom of religion as protected by the First Amendment was sacrosanct, but just ten years later, under pressure from the abortion cartel and pharmaceutical and insurance giants, the Obama administration was requiring abortion and contraception to be part of "healthcare coverage" regardless of religious or moral objection to these anti-life practices.

During his visit to the U.S. in 2008, Pope Benedict XVI had warned that radical secularism would lead to an attack on religious liberty, and Pope Francis repeatedly highlighted the importance of religious freedom and met briefly with Kim Davis and the Little Sisters of the Poor during his own tour of the U.S. in 2015. The ObamaCare assault on our first freedom provoked a well-organized religious liberty campaign led by our bishops during the 2010s, including an annual Fortnight for Freedom, that led ultimately to the reversal of Obama's HHS mandate and many other anti-religious regulations by the Trump administration.

The confident exuberance and idealistic optimism for world peace, freedom, and prosperity that marked the beginning of the third millennium, nicely encapsulated in the Ford Millennium Anthem "Just Wave Hello," soon proved ill-founded. The shocking destruction of the World Trade Center's iconic Twin Towers by Israeli intelligence agents disguised as Arab terrorists on September 11, 2001 and subsequent terrorist attacks all over the world; the U.S. invasion of Iraq against the urgent advice of Pope John Paul II; the unabated continuation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; the ongoing exodus of Christians from the Holy Land; the U.S. support for ISIS that led to its occupation of the Nineveh Plain in 2014 with subsequent murder and displacement of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Christians and Muslims and the destruction of dozens of ancient churches and monasteries; widespread drug and human trafficking in Central America; civil wars over natural resources in several African countries; brutal Communist repression in China; and North Korea's nuclear weapons tests were just a few symptoms of the pervasive lack of peace and freedom in our twenty-first century world.

Nor was global prosperity so easy to achieve as it seemed, although the spectacular advance of digital technology has led to nearly everyone on earth owning at least one cell phone and the rise of social media has interconnected us as never before. As John Paul II and other twentieth-century Popes predicted in their social encyclicals, transnational capitalism and free trade driven mainly by greed and untethered from moral and ethical considerations have led to the exploitation of cheap labor, economic instability, enormous gaps between rich and poor within the same nation, social unrest, emigration, and environmental degradation. Famine, poverty, and starvation are still common in many countries, and tens of millions of people have left the Third World in search of gainful employment here and in Europe. Benedict XVI's masterful 2009 encyclical Caritas in Veritate (Charity in Truth) features a penetrating analysis of these problems and beautifully explains why truth and love are essential to a healthy global economy.

Meanwhile, most European countries have largely succumbed to the forces of radical secularism and hedonism, with weekly church attendance in the single digits and their native populations in dramatic decline due to widespread abortion, euthanasia, and the unpopularity of marriage and traditional family life.

Notable changes from historic climate patterns were observed around the world from 2000 to 2019, but the main source of climate change was obscured by thick clouds of "global warming" propaganda and dire warnings of an impending man-made climate emergency. By virtue of its massive size and tremendous energy output, the sun is the dominant influence on earth's weather, beside which all other influences combined, including human CO2 output, are minor. Astronomers have noticed a general decline in solar activity, including a reduced number of sunspots, during this period. And NASA climate satellites have recorded a 3/10 of a degree drop in Earth's average global temperature from 1998 to 2017. Observed changes in solar activity have been the primary cause of climatic changes during the past twenty years.

The truth about the dramatic First World honeybee die-off of the past two decades has been similarly concealed. The blame for Colony Collapse Disorder is usually pinned on a certain class of pesticides, even though their use has declined greatly with the spread of organic farming practices across North America and Europe during this period. The fact is that the proliferation of cell phones and other wireless technology has disrupted normal hive activity, killing honeybees in droves. This is painfully obvious from the fact that honeybees have remained abundant in the ever fewer and shrinking parts of our country and the world where cell phone service is still absent.

To summarize, the overall picture we see here is a mixed bag, with the Church on the whole doing well and our country and our world faring rather poorly. Yet perhaps the most significant negative aspect of the past twenty years is that many of us have been so caught up in the daily newsfeed that we've lost a sense of perspective on the bigger picture, where we've come from and where we're heading, and we're ignoring or forgetting the valuable lessons history has to teach us about our current problems. The Bible says that without a vision, the people perish. In this regard, I heartily recommend Fr. George Rutler's book Calm in Chaos: Catholic Wisdom for Anxious Times.

All of the above mentioned problems in the Church, our country, and the world at large can be traced back to human failure to observe the two great commandments of love of God and love of neighbor. As Pope Benedict said, when we exalt ourselves above God, when we exclude Him as irrelevant, we succumb to the dictatorship of radical secularism. And as Pope Francis said, when we exalt ourselves above our neighbor, we fall prey to the cancer of indifference.

Pundits and interested parties too often exaggerate the gravity of today's problems, forgetting or ignoring the fact that our loving God, who created us, redeems us, sanctifies us, and sustains us in existence at every moment, knows all of our problems and their root causes intimately and is ready to help us resolve them if we humbly turn to Him and request His assistance. When asked what's wrong with the world, G.K. Chesterton famously quipped, "I am!" And Saint Pio of Pietrelcina declared that the solution to all the world's problems is personal holiness. The future of the Church, our country, and our world will be brighter if many of us answer the call to daily conversion, thus radiating the light of faith, hope, and love into the darkness of doubt, despair, and hatred.


Copyright © 2020 Justin D. Soutar.

Our Shepherd Among Us: Reminiscences and Reflections (Part Three)

by Justin Soutar


After making the short flight from New York to Philadelphia on Saturday morning, September 26, Pope Francis found himself standing in front of historic Independence Hall that afternoon, where he delivered an important address on the topic of religious liberty to the substantial crowd gathered on the Mall. While following his prepared text, the Holy Father also inserted a number of impromptu remarks to help flesh out his thoughts. He began by observing that the truths enshrined in our Declaration of Independence--that all men and women are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, and that governments exist to protect and defend those rights—“must constantly be reaffirmed, re-appropriated and defended.” The pontiff then highlighted a key aspect of religious liberty. "Religious freedom certainly means the right to worship God, individually and in community, as our consciences dictate,” Francis acknowledged. “But religious liberty, by its nature, transcends places of worship and the private sphere of individuals and families.” Then the pope underlined what he had just read by adding off-the-cuff: “Because the religious reality, the religious dimension, is not a subculture. It is part of the culture of any people and any nation.”

As American Catholics and Christians whose religious freedom is increasingly threatened by the tyranny of radical secularism, these were important words for us to hear. We needed to be reminded that the Christian religion is inextricably woven into the fabric of our national culture, and that we should take pride in this fact rather than allowing militant secularists to intimidate us into being ashamed of it. “In a world where various forms of modern tyranny seek to suppress religious freedom, or try to reduce it to a subculture without right to a voice in the public square, or to use religion as a pretext for hatred and brutality,” Francis proclaimed, “it is imperative that the followers of the various religions join their voices in calling for peace, tolerance and respect for the dignity and rights of others.”

That evening at the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Pope Francis participated in the Festival of Families, a spectacularly beautiful celebration of Catholic family life that marked the ceremonial climax of the World Meeting of Families. Here he laid aside his prepared text for the occasion, choosing instead to speak off the cuff about the beauty of family life to his on-site audience of about one million people from all over the world. Thanking the assembled families for their testimonies and their presence, the Holy Father assured them “that it is worthwhile to live as a family, that a society grows strong, grows in goodness, grows in beauty and truly grows if it is built on the foundation of the family.” He reminded them that when God sent His Son into the world to redeem fallen humanity, he came to live among us in a family through the loving obedience of Mary and Joseph.

“God always knocks at the door of hearts,” Francis said. “He likes to do this. It comes from His heart. But, do you know what He likes best? To knock on the doors of families and find families that are united, to find families that love each other, to find the families that bring up their children and educate them and help them to keep going forward and that create a society of goodness, of truth, and of beauty.” As usual when discussing this subject, the pope did not gloss over the difficulties of family life: “In families, we argue; in families, sometimes the plates fly; in families, the children give us headaches. And I’m not even going to mention the mother-in-law. But in families, there is always, always, the cross. Always…But, in families as well, after the cross, there is the resurrection. Because the Son of God opened for us this path.” Francis concluded his remarks to the tens of thousands of families present by reminding them to take special care of their children and their grandparents--whom he referred to respectively as the “strength” and the “memory” of a family--as “a sign of love that promises the future.”

“All of Us Need to Be Cleansed”

Around 11 AM on Sunday morning, September 27, after meeting with bishops, priests and seminarians at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary, Pope Francis went to visit more than one hundred male and female inmates at the Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility in Philadelphia. This was one of the most memorable parts of our Holy Father’s visit to the United States because it gave such vividly personal expression to the theme of divine mercy that has defined his pontificate from the very beginning. The pope sat in a large wooden chair that had been handcrafted for the occasion by a team of male prisoners skilled in carpentry work. His address to the inmates was strikingly heartfelt and poignant, full of Christ-like compassion and encouragement for these men and women who had committed various crimes in the past. Francis acknowledged that their period of incarceration was “a painful time” not only for them but for their families and society, and then warned that a family or society "which cannot share or take seriously the pain of its children, and views that pain as something normal or to be expected, is a society ‘condemned’ to remain a hostage to itself, prey to the very things which cause that pain.”

The Holy Father himself was offering a different example that morning, an example of compassion and solidarity, by personally identifying with these wounded children of God who had been relegated to the outskirts of society and who are often forgotten and marginalized by their free brothers and sisters. “I am here as a pastor, but above all as a brother, to share your situation and to make it my own,” the pope told the inmates. Recalling the Gospel scene in which Jesus washes his disciples’ feet, Francis reflected that life is a journey along different roads that leave their mark on us. “Life means ‘getting our feet dirty’ from the dust-filled roads of life and history,” he said. “All of us need to be cleansed, to be washed.”

“We know in faith that Jesus seeks us out,” the Holy Father continued. “He wants to heal our wounds, to soothe our feet which hurt from travelling alone, to wash each of us clean of the dust from our journey. He doesn’t ask us where we have been, he doesn’t question us about what we have done. Rather, he tells us: ‘Unless I wash your feet, you have no share with me’ (John 13:8)…Jesus comes to meet us, so that he can restore our dignity as children of God. He wants to help us to set out again, to resume our journey, to recover our hope, to restore our faith and trust.” These encouraging words revealed the pastoral heart of Pope Francis—a compassionate and charitable heart that reaches out to everyone regardless of their background or their situation, offering hope for redemption through a personal encounter with Christ. The pope then criticized prison systems that carelessly neglect to heal the wounds of their inmates or to offer them hope for a better life. “It is painful when we see prison systems which are not concerned to care for wounds, to soothe pain, to offer new possibilities,” he said. “It is painful when we see people who think that only others need to be cleansed, purified, and do not recognize that their weariness, pain and wounds are also the weariness, pain and wounds of society.”

After finishing his address, Pope Francis took time to greet most of the seated inmates individually. In a particularly poignant moment, he warmly embraced a male inmate who stood up to greet him, drawing a smattering of applause from the others. As the pontiff made his rounds and then bade the prisoners farewell, I was a bit disappointed that the commentary of Raymond Arroyo, Fr. Gerald Murray and Robert Royal on EWTN was mainly confined to the awful crimes these people had committed, the duty of those responsible for the common good to protect society from unjust aggressors, and the moral licitness of the death penalty as just punishment for murder. While everything they said may have been true, their rather clinical and juridical attitude towards this deeply moving, authentically Christian personal encounter of Pope Francis with the least of Christ’s brethren seemed to evince just a bit of the rigorist tendency, persistently decried by Francis, of those who are so caught up in their knowledge of Church doctrine and legal matters that they cannot see the person in front of them. By zeroing in on the justice aspect, on doctrinal and criminal details, Arroyo and his fellow guests essentially missed the point of what the pope had just said and what he was now doing right in front of their eyes on the TV screen—performing two works of mercy, visiting prisoners and comforting the sorrowful. As Mother Teresa would remind us, these people sitting behind bars are Christ in his distressing disguise, and whatever we do for them we do for Christ himself (Mt. 25:34). “’I was…in prison and you visited me’” (Mt. 25:35, 36).

Furthermore, the EWTN commentators neglected to affirm that these incarcerated men and women, like themselves, were made in the image and likeness of God and that they retained their innate human dignity regardless of what they had done that had necessarily led to their confinement within these walls. Nor did they hint at the corruption and related issues affecting the current US criminal justice system, including the urgent need for prison reform and the sad reality that some of those incarcerated and executed each year are actually innocent of the crimes of which they have been convicted. Finally, mention could have been made of the fact that human justice is never perfect and that everything will be satisfactorily sorted out for all parties only by Christ Himself at the Last Judgment, where each of us Christians will be judged based not on our knowledge of the faith, but on how well we have put that faith into practice. May our prejudices not hinder us from following Pope Francis’ Christ-like example in this regard and encouraging others to do the same.

Faith and Love in the Family

That Sunday afternoon, under mostly cloudy skies, the Argentinian pontiff celebrated the much-anticipated Closing Mass for the World Meeting of Families at the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia, another spectacular event which drew nearly 900,000 participants according to the official host, Archbishop Charles Chaput. In an apparent oversight, the pope’s homily was delivered in Spanish without translation of any kind, and I felt sorry for the English-speaking majority of the vast congregation present who essentially missed it. The Mass readings for that Sunday focused on how the Holy Spirit can act outside the visible confines of the Church or the community and how we should recognize and affirm such divine activity even when it is manifested in unlikely places. In his homily, Francis alerted his hearers to “the temptation to be scandalized by the freedom of God, who sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous alike (Mt. 5:45), bypassing bureaucracy, officialdom and inner circles”; such a temptation, he warned, “threatens the authenticity of faith. Hence it must be vigorously rejected.” Explaining why Jesus’ condemnation of scandal was so harsh, the Holy Father added: “For Jesus, the truly ‘intolerable’ scandal consists in everything that breaks down and destroys our trust in the working of the Spirit!”

Turning to the subject of faith, Pope Francis next spoke of the importance of “little gestures” of tenderness and affection that are learned in the family, such as a warm meal or a hug or a blessing. “Love is shown by little things, by attention to small daily signs which make us feel at home,” he said. “Faith grows when it is lived and shaped by love.” Francis urged us to be open to these “little miracles of love,” these “prophetic gestures” that point the way to God’s unbounded love. He then asked whether we are living this way in our families and societies. The pope exclaimed, “Would that all of us could be open to miracles of love for the sake of our own family and all the families of the world, and thus overcome the scandal of a narrow, petty love, closed in on itself, impatient of others!” Here he inserted an off-the-cuff remark, asking us family members whether we yell at each other or speak with love and tenderness.

In keeping with his theme of care for creation, Francis also asked what kind of world we are leaving to our children. “Our common house can no longer tolerate sterile divisions,” he proclaimed. “The urgent challenge of protecting our home includes the effort to bring the entire human family together in the pursuit of a sustainable and integral development.” Affirming marriage as “the covenant of man and woman, which generates life and reveals God,” the Holy Father concluded by praying that God may “grant to all of us, as the Lord’s disciples, the grace to be worthy of this purity of heart which is not scandalized by the Gospel!” At the end of the Mass, Francis thanked the assembled worshipers in English for their witness of family life and, as always, reminded them to pray for him.

A Stunning Success

Pope Francis clearly scored a massive hit with American Catholics and the general public during his unforgettable visit to our country late last month. Perhaps more strikingly than any other foreign voyage he has yet undertaken, the pope’s whirlwind tour of America showcased the genius of Francis at its classic best. In both word and deed, our Holy Father proclaimed the truths we needed to hear with clarity and conviction, yet in an attractive way, while consistently manifesting an accurate understanding and sincere appreciation for our unique history and cultural heritage. He knew his audience more intuitively and was better prepared to visit the United States than most of us expected. In short, Francis surprised us once again with a brilliant performance—although it wasn’t surprising to see an increase in the respect and esteem of American Catholics and the general public for our beloved Shepherd in Christ following his brief but intense sojourn among us. Although decades will be required to fully assess the impact of this latest papal visit on the American Catholic Church and on our country in general, as well as to place it within an accurate historical perspective, we can safely conclude for the moment that Pope Francis’ Pastoral Visit to the United States was a stunning success, and that we will continue to reap its fruit for years to come.


Copyright © 2015 Justin D. Soutar. All rights reserved.

Reflection for Solemnity of Christ the King

"Divine authority is not a power of nature. It is the power of God's love that creates the universe and, incarnating itself in the Only Begotten Son, descending into our humanity, it heals the world corrupted by sin. Romano Guardini writes: 'Jesus' whole existence is the translation of power into humility … it is sovereignty that here abases itself in the form of servant' (Power and Responsibility, Regnery, 1961).

"Often for man authority means possession, power, dominance, success. For God, instead, authority means service, humility, love; it means entering into the logic of Jesus who stoops to wash the feet of his disciples (cf. John 13:5), who seeks man's true good, who heals wounds, who is capable of a love so great that he gives his life, because he is Love. In one of her letters, St. Catherine of Siena writes: 'It is necessary that we see and know, in truth, with the light of faith, that God is the Supreme and Eternal Love, and he cannot will anything if not our good' (Ep. 13 in: Le Lettere, vol. 3, Bologna 1999, 206)."

--Benedict XVI, Angelus Address, January 30, 2012

Quote of the Day

"The starting point of salvation is not the confession of the sovereignty of Christ, but rather the imitation of Jesus’ works of mercy through which he brought about his kingdom. The one who accomplishes these works shows that he has welcomed Christ’s sovereignty, because he has opened his heart to God’s charity. In the twilight of life we will be judged on our love for, closeness to and tenderness towards our brothers and sisters. Upon this will depend our entry into, or exclusion from, the kingdom of God: our belonging to the one side or the other. Through his victory, Jesus has opened to us his kingdom. But it is for us to enter into it, beginning with our life now, by being close in concrete ways to our brothers and sisters who ask for bread, clothing, acceptance, solidarity. If we truly love them, we will be willing to share with them what is most precious to us, Jesus himself and his Gospel."

--Pope Francis

Quote of the Day

"The grandeur of love is revealed in taking care of one in need, with fidelity and patience; therefore, great is the love that is able to make itself little for others, like Jesus, who made himself a servant. To love is to come close, to touch the flesh of Christ in the poor and the least, to open to God’s grace the needs, the appeals, the solitude of persons that surround us."

--Pope Francis

Quote of the Day

"In every human situation, marked by frailty, sin and death, the Good News is no mere matter of words, but a testimony to unconditional and faithful love: it is about leaving ourselves behind and encountering others, being close to those crushed by life’s troubles, sharing with the needy, standing at the side of the sick, elderly and the outcast...Love is more powerful, love gives life, love makes hope blossom in the wilderness."

--Pope Francis

Quote of the Day

"What is important for all people, what makes their life significant, is the knowledge they are loved. The person in a difficult situation will hold on if he knows, Someone is waiting for me, someone wants me and needs me. God is there first and loves me. And that is the trustworthy ground on which my life is standing and on which I myself can construct it."

--Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (Benedict XVI), God and the World (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2002), pp. 26-27

Quote of the Day

“These hypocritical people [the Pharisees] are good persons. They do all they should do. They seem good. But they are ethicists without goodness because they have lost the sense of belonging to a people! Our Lord gives us salvation through belonging to a people...

“Our perfection, our holiness is linked with our people where we are chosen and become part. Our greatest act of holiness relates to the flesh of our brother and the flesh of Jesus Christ. Our act of holiness today, here at the altar, is not a hypocritical fasting: instead it means not being ashamed of the flesh of Christ which comes here today!

“This is the mystery of the Body and Blood of Christ. It means going to share our bread with the hungry, taking care of the sick, the elderly, those who can’t give us anything in return: this is not being ashamed of the flesh!...

“Am I ashamed of the flesh of my brother and sister? When I give alms, do I drop the coin without touching the hand (of the poor person, beggar)? And if by chance I do touch it, do I immediately withdraw it? When I give alms, do I look into the eyes of my brother, my sister? When I know a person is ill, do I go and visit that person? Do I greet him or her with affection?...

Am I capable of giving a caress or a hug to the sick, the elderly, the children, or have I lost sight of the meaning of a caress? These hypocrites were unable to give a caress. They had forgotten how to do it...

“Don’t be ashamed of the flesh of our brother. It’s our flesh! We will be judged by the way we behave towards this brother, this sister.”

--Pope Francis

God Is With Us

by Justin Soutar

December 31, 2013

The end of 2013 is now upon us. Two thousand nine years have elapsed since our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, was born of the Virgin Mary in a stable cave in Bethlehem, in the land of Israel. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whosoever believes in him may not perish, but may have life everlasting” (John 3:16). The entrance of the eternal and all-powerful Son of God into our sinful world in the form of a tiny little baby was such a profoundly transformative historical event that it split in two the way we reckon time: All the years leading up to Christ’s birth are denominated B. C. (Before Christ), while the years following His birth are designated A. D. (Anno Domini, the Year of our Lord). From the time of the original sin of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, the people of Israel waited four thousand years for the coming of the Messiah who would save them from their sins and reconcile them with God. All the righteous people who lived and died in those millennia preceding Christ couldn’t go to Heaven but had to wait in Sheol, “the abode of the dead,” until Christ by His Passion, Death, Resurrection, and Ascension liberated the captives and opened the gates of Heaven. Christ’s coming to earth some two thousand years ago changed the world forever, bringing light to those in darkness and hope to those in despair. Through His Church, Christ offers all men and women forgiveness of their sins and restoration of the greatest gift any human being could ever possess: the gift of sanctifying grace, the gift Adam and Eve lost by sin, which gives us a share in God’s own Trinitarian life, makes us His sons and daughters, and entitles us to share in the unimaginable happiness of Heaven for all eternity after our death. Wow! That is something to rejoice about. That is the Good News of the Gospel that we as Christians are called to share with everyone on this earth. God indeed loves us more than we can ever imagine in our little finite human minds. We believe in His love, and we hope in His love. Faith, hope and love go together. But “the greatest of these is love.”

Now, the fact that we acknowledge and believe all this to be true does not allow us to ignore or gloss over the realities of sin, suffering, evil, and death that continue to afflict our world. Christ’s descent to earth two thousand years ago did not magically dispel these tragic realities that have marked and continue to mark human history. Rather, his Incarnation was just the beginning of God’s definitive triumph over sin and death that will be completed at the end of the world, when Christ will return in glory to judge all mankind and when God will create new heavens and a new earth. The continuing and even worsening presence of sin and evil, suffering and death in our world is a mysterious part of God’s master plan for human history. Not that God originally willed or made any of these negative realities, but in the unfathomable designs of his Providence, God is allowing them for His own reasons that we human beings, constrained by our finite minds and short lifetimes, cannot fully understand or appreciate. Our faith tells us that God holds all of His creation in His hands at every moment and that He governs it through His Providence, so we have to trust that He knows what He is about. Our faith also tells us that God brings good out of evil, and that this is the reason why He allows evil in the first place. The worst evil He ever permitted—the murder of His own Son on a cross—led to the greatest good possible, our salvation from sin and reconciliation with God. If God allowed his own perfectly holy and innocent Son to suffer such a cruel fate, can we sinners who follow Him reasonably expect to have a carefree and easy life? No. On the contrary, Jesus said that if anyone wishes to come after Him, he must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow Him. Being a Christian is not easy; it’s not a joyride. Not as long as we live on this earth. But as Saint Paul reminds us, the sufferings of this present life are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come. Even a life full of pain and suffering for more than 100 years would be a small price to pay for the eternal happiness of Heaven. Christ the Son of God did not come to earth to free us from suffering; rather, he came to share in our humanity, in our human experiences and sufferings and miseries, to show us how to suffer well, and to illuminate our sufferings with the comfort of His loving presence in our lives. Through his heroic self-sacrifice for our sins out of love for us, Christ has given us the opportunity to freely and spiritually unite our own sufferings with his, thus giving them a redemptive value and Christian meaning for our own greater good and that of our fellow brothers and sisters. In some mysterious way, it is precisely when God seems to be at His weakest by permitting terrible evils that His almighty power is most gloriously manifest. So while sin and all its accompanying dark realities remain present in our world, God is with us. He has entered into our history and profoundly and irrevocably altered its course. Troubled and threatened as it is, our world today is a brighter and happier place than it would otherwise have been because the quiet and peaceful light of the Son of God made Man has entered it and continued to illuminate it ever since that first Christmas more than twenty centuries ago.

Through the joys and surprises, successes and failures, sorrows and vicissitudes of this past year, God’s mysterious wisdom and Providence were remarkably evident. The historic resignation of Pope Benedict XVI and the unforeseen election of Pope Francis were two of the most surprising and joyful events of the year, respectively. I was sad to see Pope Benedict go and unsure at first about Pope Francis, but now I see God’s hand in these events. God inspired Pope Benedict, who served His Church humbly and well, to resign a very demanding position because of his ailing health, in order to allow for the election of a new and different kind of Pope from Latin America who would reacquaint a Church in need of reform and a world in need of God with the joy and simplicity of the Gospel message. If Benedict had not resigned, Pope Francis could not have brought together three million young people for World Youth Day in Rio de Janiero. Nor could he have inspired Pope Francis to summon the whole Church and the world to pray and fast for peace, thus averting what could have been a disastrous U.S. war with Syria. Nor could God have used him to wake up the Church and the world to that terrible evil that has come to plague our modern globalized society, namely, the globalization of indifference, our callousness and lack of concern for our suffering brothers and sisters all around the world, symbolized by the repeated tragedy of impoverished African migrants shipwrecked and drowned at Lampedusa. Although it did not anticipate his election, the world has come to love Pope Francis. God is obviously using him in a big way, as we never could have expected back in February when Pope Benedict made his stunning announcement. And, to top it all off, Benedict XVI continues to serve the Church, including his successor Pope Francis, through his prayers, writings, and friendship. The ways of God are marvelous indeed!

Of course, we cannot overlook the fact that many bad things happened this year also. Several more states and additional foreign countries legalized homosexual “marriage,” which is against nature and nature’s God. Abortion, hunger, violence, and war claimed millions of innocent lives. Violence destroyed lives and valuable property in Egypt, Syria, Sudan and elsewhere, while millions of people in the Middle East and Africa are living in refugee camps, largely forgotten by most of us. The tiny Christian community in the Holy Land dwindled further as Christians continued their steady exodus, while continued injustice and terrorist violence driven by religious fundamentalism (both Jewish and Muslim) kept the Israeli-Palestinian conflict boiling hotter than ever. Droughts, floods, storms, mudslides and famines affected many parts of the globe. Poverty, disease, and corruption continued to affect most nations of Africa, while the global gap between rich and poor is wider than ever before.

And here in the United States, despite strong leadership from our Catholic bishops and the prayers and action of millions of Americans, our predominantly immoral and corrupt federal government has stubbornly refused to significantly amend or withdraw its immoral, unjust and unconstitutional anti-life mandate, which is set to begin being enforced tomorrow. I have a feeling that, once our government attempts to enforce this illegitimate law, our country may never be the same. But regardless of the terrible consequences such enforcement will bring, we must not give up the fight for the natural law, for our religious liberties, or for our moral conscience rights. We must continue fighting until this unconscionable law is repealed and our God-given human rights are once again officially recognized and respected in law.

As followers of Christ, we are a people of hope. However, Christian hope is not simply blind optimism in the face of difficult situations. Nor is Christian hope dependent upon changing circumstances and temporal realities. Rather, our hope is in God. God is with us. He, the same God who became man out of love for us, who accompanies us in our earthly lives, is the all-powerful and wise God who directs the course of history toward its ultimate end, which is His glory. God’s Kingdom will ultimately be triumphant over the powers of darkness, and we who serve Him faithfully on earth will reign with Him forever in Heaven.

In conclusion, the following lines from an old song ring even truer today than when they were first penned:

I heard the bells on Christmas Day Their old familiar carols play, And mild and sweet The words repeat Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Then in despair I bowed my head, “There is no peace on earth,” I said; For hate is strong, And mocks the song Of peace on earth, good will to men.

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep: “God is not dead, nor doth He sleep. The wrong will fail, The right prevail, With peace on earth, good will to men.”

Wishing you a blessed New Year.



Copyright © 2013 Justin D. Soutar. All rights reserved.

Thought for the Day

“The joy of God is not the death of the sinner, but the life of the sinner. And how far from this were those who murmured against Jesus, how far from the heart of God! They didn’t know Him. They thought that being religious, being good people meant always being well-mannered and polite, and often pretending to be polite, right? This is the hypocrisy of the murmuring. But the joy of God the Father, in fact, is love. He loves us. 'But I’m a sinner, I’ve done this and that and the other!' 'But I love you anyway, and I go out searching for you, and I bring you home.' This is our Father. Let’s reflect on this.”

--Pope Francis

Quote of the Day

Man lives on truth and on being loved: on being loved by the truth. He needs God, the God who draws close to him, interprets for him the meaning of life, and thus points him toward the path of life. Of course, man needs bread, he needs food for the body, but ultimately what he needs most is the Word, love, God himself.

--Pope Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth--Part One: From the Baptism in the Jordan to the Transfiguration (New York: Doubleday, 2007), p. 279

Quote of the Day

"Faith and violence are incompatible! But faith and strength go together. The Christian is not violent, but he is strong. And with what strength? That of meekness, the force of meekness, the force of love.” --Pope Francis

Pope Francis: Pastor of the World

The world is now seeing what a devout Catholic pastor of souls from Argentina looks like in the person of our current Holy Father, Pope Francis. His quiet reserve, his deep prayerfulness and spirituality, his humility and charity, his simple and frugal lifestyle, his doctrinal orthodoxy, his liturgical reverence, and especially his personal pastoral style and his exceptional talent as a preacher and communicator, all remind me of Father Abel, the saintly Argentinian pastor of my childhood and early teen years at Our Lady of Guadalupe Parish in Guadalupe, California. A good deal of prayer, careful study, and meditation under the guidance of the Holy Spirit went into the preparation of each of his daily morning Mass homilies on the Scripture readings. Despite his unassuming exterior, Father Abel was quite erudite, well versed in Catholic doctrine and theology and the Fathers and Doctors of the Church as well as in biblical history and exegesis. Moreover, he was in tune with where Pope John Paul II and Cardinal Ratzinger were leading the Church at the dawn of the Third Millennium. As well as a man of deep prayer and high education, Father Abel was a good teacher. His daily Mass homilies, which often focused on three basic “elements,” were simple and direct, yet profound and rich in theological insights—much like those of Pope Francis. They were always delivered slowly and carefully, so that we could grasp each word and idea he was presenting to us, and he would make direct eye contact with each of his listeners as he spoke, just as Pope Francis does. And, best of all, these homilies always came straight from his head and his heart, without the aid of a prepared text—just like the daily Mass homilies of Pope Francis.

Father Abel’s homilies illuminated the Scriptures and made them come alive for us simple lay people. He was a true pastor, who fed us spiritually with the Word of God and the sacraments of the Church and who inspired us to live our Christian faith by his example of a holy life. Now Pope Francis—another Argentinian Catholic pastor of souls—is doing the same thing as shepherd of his little flock at the Domus Sanctha Marthae, as the Bishop of Rome, and as the Supreme Pastor of the Universal Church. Like his patron, Saint Francis of Assisi, he is a reformer, called by God to rebuild His crumbling Church in a corrupt and materialistic age of radical secularism. He is carrying out this mission of reform quite simply and effectively by courageously preaching and authentically living the full truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. By his clear teaching and personal example of humble service, he is returning the Church to the roots of its faith and to the essence of the Gospel message.

From his earliest words and actions as the Successor of Saint Peter, this man has made it clear that he has come to serve, not to be served. By humbly referring to himself as “the Bishop of Rome” rather than as “the Pope,” he indicated that he is not interested in using the power of the papacy to control and dominate others for his own self-aggrandizement—as some arrogant and corrupt pontiffs in Church history have unfortunately done, leading to divisions, schisms, and wars. Rather, Pope Francis sees his office as a ministry of loving service to Christ’s faithful, whose task as Bishop of Rome is to “preside over all the churches in charity” and thus keep them united in the one true faith of Christ. This simple and humble approach to the papacy is in keeping with the desires for papal reform and Christian unity expressed by Blessed John Paul II in his 1995 encyclical Ut Unum Sint (That They May All Be One). Pope Francis’ profound humility and charity are having a remarkably strong positive effect on leaders of the Orthodox churches, which have been separated from full communion with Rome since 1054. His papal inauguration Mass was the first in nearly a millennium to be attended by the Patriarch of Constantinople. That highly significant gesture was a clear sign that, under the influence of Pope Francis, the Orthodox Churches have now begun moving seriously toward full reunion with the Church of Rome. After all, it was not so much doctrinal disagreements and cultural differences that divided the Eastern and Western Churches, but rather the imperial, domineering attitude of certain corrupt and power-hungry Popes in the early Middle Ages that led to the Great Schism. Just as a lack of charity by certain Popes divided the Churches, the charity of Pope Francis is helping to reunite them and heal the old wounds of division.

The humble Christian attitude and warm personal approach of Pope Francis have not only endeared him to his fellow Catholics and to other Christians, but have also drawn the admiration and respect of people of goodwill throughout the modern secular world. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon praised him as “a man of peace and purpose” and “a voice for the voiceless.” He has been nominated “Man of the Year” by Vanity Fair magazine. “Pope Francis is the best news for the Catholic Church in centuries,” declared singer Elton John in a recent interview. “On his own, this man has succeeded in bringing people back to Christ’s teachings…Non-Catholics like me rise to their feet to applaud the humility of every gesture of his…Francis is a miracle of humility in an age of vanity.” And Italian atheist Giorgio Faletti admitted that “Jorge Mario Bergoglio seemed to me immediately a great communicator, a person that by his face inspires that goodness that the representative of Catholics in the world must inspire, a man who has the qualities to repair with his figure all the scandals that recently have damaged the image of the Vatican and what it represents.”

In his formally prepared speeches and addresses as well as in his extemporaneous daily Mass homilies in the Domus Sanctha Marthae chapel, Pope Francis courageously preaches the full truth of Christ’s Gospel, without minimizing or glossing over difficult or controversial areas. In his first homily as Pope given in the Sistine Chapel, he urged the Church not to reject the cross: “When we journey without the cross…we are not disciples of the Lord.” In the homily at his installation Mass, Pope Francis reminded us of our basic human responsibility to protect all of God’s creation, including human life and the natural environment, for the benefit of all. In his first address to the Holy See’s diplomatic corps, he drew attention to “the spiritual poverty of our time” manifested in what his predecessor Benedict XVI used to call “the ‘tyranny of relativism’,” and stated: “Francis of Assisi tells us we should work to build peace. But there is no true peace without truth! There cannot be true peace if everyone is his own criterion, if everyone can always claim exclusively his own rights, without at the same time caring for the good of others, of everyone, on the basis of the nature that unites every human being on this earth." In line with his two predecessors, Pope Francis has also criticized the injustice and inhumanity of the current global economic system that allows a few to profit enormously at the expense of many. He has condemned “the dictatorship of a nameless, faceless economy” and pointed out that we have fallen into a “globalized indifference” that has robbed us of the ability to sympathize with our suffering brothers and sisters in other parts of the world. Through these and many other homilies and addresses, Pope Francis is shaking us Christians out of our comfortable complacency and challenging us to live the Gospel in such a total, radical and authentic way that it completely changes our lives and transforms the modern world.

In his last and greatest encyclical, Caritas in Veritate (Charity in Truth), Pope Benedict XVI proclaimed: “To defend the truth, to articulate it with humility and conviction, and to bear witness to it in life are…exacting and indispensable forms of charity.” As the 265th Successor of Saint Peter, Pope Francis is now carrying on this essential mission of Christian charity. By his words and example, he is preaching the truth that will set us free, the truth that has the power to save humanity from self-destruction. And, slowly but surely, he is drawing the modern secularized world back to Christ. Pope Francis has become more than just the leader of the Catholic Church; he has become the pastor of the world.


Copyright © 2013 Justin D. Soutar. All rights reserved.

Reflection for Today

Today no one in our world feels responsible; we have lost a sense of responsibility for our brothers and sisters. We have fallen into the hypocrisy of the priest and the levite whom Jesus described in the parable of the Good Samaritan: we see our brother half dead on the side of the road, and perhaps we say to ourselves: "poor soul…!", and then go on our way. It’s not our responsibility, and with that we feel reassured, assuaged. The culture of comfort, which makes us think only of ourselves, makes us insensitive to the cries of other people, makes us live in soap bubbles which, however lovely, are insubstantial; they offer a fleeting and empty illusion which results in indifference to others; indeed, it even leads to the globalization of indifference. In this globalized world, we have fallen into globalized indifference. We have become used to the suffering of others: it doesn’t affect me; it doesn’t concern me; it’s none of my business! .... We are a society which has forgotten how to weep, how to experience compassion – "suffering with" others: the globalization of indifference has taken from us the ability to weep! In the Gospel we have heard the crying, the wailing, the great lamentation: "Rachel weeps for her children… because they are no more". Herod sowed death to protect his own comfort, his own soap bubble. And so it continues… Let us ask the Lord to remove the part of Herod that lurks in our hearts; let us ask the Lord for the grace to weep over our indifference, to weep over the cruelty of our world, of our own hearts, and of all those who in anonymity make social and economic decisions which open the door to tragic situations like this. "Has any one wept?" Today has anyone wept in our world?

--Pope Francis, Homily at Mass in Lampedusa, Italy, July 8, 2013

On the Feast of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

Il Sacro Cuore by Pompeo Batoni (1740)
Church of the Gesu, Rome

"The best way to love Him in return is to open our hearts and let Him love us. Let Him draw close to us and feel Him close to us. This is really very difficult: letting ourselves be loved by Him. And that is perhaps what we need to ask today in the Mass: 'Lord, I want to love You, but teach me the difficult science, the difficult habit of letting myself be loved by You, to feel You close and feel Your tenderness! May the Lord give us this grace."

--Pope Francis

Mary is the Mother of Missionaries

The Visitation, Carl Heinrich Bloch (19th cent.)

Today is the Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary to her relative Elizabeth. Three years ago on this day, at a traditional Rosary celebration and candlelight procession in the Vatican Gardens to conclude the month of May, Pope Benedict XVI gave a beautiful address on today's feast in which he presented an interesting insight. He pointed out that our blessed Mother Mary is "the Mother of Missionaries" because she was the first person to bring Christ to someone else when, having recently conceived Him in her womb, she went to visit Elizabeth. Here is the full text of Pope Benedict's reflection from the Vatican web site:

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Dear Brothers and Sisters,

I join you with great joy at the end of this traditional prayer meeting which concludes the month of May in the Vatican. With reference to today's liturgy, let us contemplate Mary Most Holy in the mystery of her Visitation. We recognize in the Virgin Mary who goes to visit her kinswoman Elizabeth the clearest example and the truest meaning of our journey as believers and of the journey of the Church herself. The Church is missionary by her very nature, she is called to proclaim the Gospel everywhere and always and to pass on the faith to every man and woman, and to every culture.

"In those days", wrote St Luke the Evangelist, "Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a city of Judah" (Lk 1: 39). Mary's is a real missionary journey. It leads her far from home, impels her into the world to places alien to her daily habits; in a certain sense it stretches her to her maximum capacity. Here, also for all of us, lies the secret of our lives as men and women and Christians. Our existence as individuals and as Church is projected outside ourselves. As had happened to Abraham, we are asked to come out of ourselves, from where we feel safe, to reach out to others in different places and surroundings. It is the Lord who asks this of us: "You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be my witnesses... to the end of the earth" (Acts 1: 8). And it is once again the Lord who sets us on this path beside Mary as our travelling companion and caring mother. She reassures us, for she reminds us that the Son, her Jesus, is always with us as he promised: "I am with you always, to the close of the age" (Mt 28: 20).

The Evangelist notes that "Mary remained with her" (with her relative Elizabeth) "about three months" (Lk 1: 56). These simple words explain the most immediate purpose of Mary's journey. She knew from the Angel that Elizabeth was expecting a son and that she was already in her sixth month (Lk 1: 36). However Elizabeth was elderly and the closeness of Mary, still very young, could be helpful to her. For this reason Mary visits her and stays with her about three months in order to offer her that affectionate closeness, that practical help and all those daily services she needed. Elizabeth thus becomes the symbol of many elderly and sick people indeed, of all who are in need of help and love. And how many of them there are today too in our families, in our communities and in our cities! And Mary who had described herself as "the handmaid of the Lord" (Lk 1: 38) makes herself the servant of human beings. More precisely, she serves the Lord whom she encounters in her brethren.

Yet Mary's charity does not stop at material assistance but reaches its summit in giving Jesus himself, in "favouring an encounter with him". Once again, it is St Luke who emphasizes this: "When Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb" (Lk 1: 41). We are thus at the heart and culmination of the evangelizing mission. We have come to the truest meaning and most genuine purpose of every missionary journey: to give people the living and personal Gospel which is the Lord Jesus himself. And Jesus' Gospel is a communication and a gift which as Elizabeth testifies fill the heart with joy: "For behold, when the voice of your greeting came to my years, the babe in my womb leaped for joy" (Lk 1: 44). Jesus is the only true treasure to give to humanity that we possess. It is for him that the men and women of our time have a deep longing, even when they seem to ignore or to reject him. It is for him that the society in which we live, Europe and the whole world, has so great a need.

This extraordinary responsibility is entrusted to us. Let us live it with joy and commitment, so that ours may truly be a civilization in which truth, justice, freedom and love prevail, the fundamental and irreplaceable pillars of a true orderly and peaceful coexistence. Let us live this responsibility by devoting ourselves to listening to the word of God in brotherly union, to the breaking of bread and the prayers (cf. Acts 2: 42). May this be the grace we ask of the Most Holy Virgin this evening. My Blessing to you all!


© Copyright 2010 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2010/may/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20100531_mese-mariano_en.html

On the Feast of the Most Holy Trinity

"God is not something vague, our God is not something vaporous, he is concrete, he is not an abstraction, but has a name: “God is love.” It is not a sentimental or emotive love, but the love of the Father that is the origin of every life, the love of the Son who dies on the cross and rises, the love of the Spirit, who renews man and the world. Understanding that God is love does us a lot of good, because it teaches us to love, to give ourselves to others as Jesus gave himself to us, to walk with us. Jesus walks with us along the road of life.

"The Most Holy Trinity is not the product of human reasoning; it is the face with which God himself revealed himself, not from the height of a cathedra, but walking with humanity. It is precisely Jesus who revealed the Father and promised us the Holy Spirit. God walked with his people in the history of the people of Israel and Jesus always walked with us and promised us the Holy Spirit, who is fire, who teaches us all the things that we do not know, who guides us from within, he gives us the good ideas and the good inspirations.

"Today we praise God not for a particular mystery but for himself, “for his great glory,” as the liturgical hymn says. We praise him and we thank him because he is Love, and because he calls us to enter into the embrace of his communion, which is eternal life.

"Let us place our praises in the hands of the Virgin Mary. She, the most humble of creatures, through Christ has already arrived at the goal of the earthly pilgrimage: she is already in the glory of the Trinity. Because of this Mary our Mother, Our Lady, shines for us as a sign of sure hope. She is the Mother of hope; on our journey, on our road, she is the Mother of hope. She is also the Mother who consoles us, the Mother of consolation and the Mother who is with us on the journey."

--Pope Francis