By Vatican News staff writer
Pope Francis observed the solemn Feast of All Saints inviting the faithful to reflect on the great hope that is based on Christ’s resurrection.
Speaking during the Sunday Angelus, the Pope upheld the Saints and Blesseds as the most authoritative witnesses of Christian hope. He also invited us all to choose purity, meekness and mercy while entrusting ourselves to the Lord and dedicating ourselves to justice and peace.
He reflected on two Beatitudes – the second and the third – that, he said, Jesus preached and which resound in the Liturgy (see Mt 5:1-12a), and described them as the path to holiness.
The second Beatitude
The Pope said the second one is “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted”. These words, he explained, seem contradictory because mourning is not a sign of joy and happiness. But Jesus, he continued, proclaims blessed those who mourn because of suffering, sins and the difficulties of everyday life, but “who trust in the Lord despite everything and put themselves under His shadow.”
“They are not indifferent, nor do they harden their hearts when they are in pain, but they patiently hope for God’s comfort. And they experience this comfort even in this life,” he said.
The third Beatitude
In the third Beatitude, Pope Francis said, Jesus states: “Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth”. Meekness, he noted, is characteristic of Jesus, who said of Himself: “Learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart” (Mt 11:29).
The meek, the Pope continued, are those “who know how to control themselves, who leave space for the other, they listen to the other, respect the other’s way of living, his or her needs and requests.”
They do not intend to overwhelm or diminish the other, he said, they do not want to dominate or impose their ideas or interests to the detriment of others.
Go against the current: Be meek, work for justice and peace
People like this, he said, may not be appreciated by the world and its mentality, but they are precious in God’s eyes: “God gives them the promised land as an inheritance, that is, life eternal. This beatitude also begins here below and is fulfilled in Heaven.”
Especially at a time like this, with so much aggressivity in the world, he continued, meekness is the way to go forward with humility and mercy.
Thus the Pope invited the faithful to choose a life of purity, meekness and mercy; to entrust themselves to God in poverty of spirit and in affliction: “This means going against the current in respect to this world’s mentality, in respect to the culture of possessing, of meaningless fun, of arrogance against the weakest.”
A personal and universal vocation to holiness
Pope Francis concluded saying that this evangelical path was trodden by the Saints and Blesseds and that today’s solemnity, that honours All Saints, reminds us of “the personal and universal vocation to holiness, and proposes sure models for this journey that each person walks in a unique and unrepeatable way, according to the “imagination” of the Holy Spirit.”
