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To make a concrete response to the appeal of our brothers and sisters in humanity, we must come to grips with the first of these challenges: solidarity among generations, solidarity between countries and entire continents, so that all human beings may share more equitably in the riches of our planet. This is one of the essential services that people of good will must render to humanity. The earth, in fact, can produce enough to nourish all its inhabitants, on the condition that the rich countries do not keep for themselves what belongs to all.
The unbreakable bond between love of God and love of neighbor is emphasized. One is so closely connected to the other that to say that we love God becomes a lie if we are closed to our neighbor or hate him altogether. Saint John's words should rather be interpreted to mean that love of neighbor is a path that leads to the encounter with God, and that closing our eyes to our neighbor also blinds us to God.
I thank Missio, (Pontifical Mission Societies), the primary instruments for cooperation in the universal Church's universal mission in the world. Through their action, the proclamation of the Gospel bears witness to Christ and is lived out in service of our neighbour through justice for the poorest, education in isolated villages, medical care in remote areas, freedom from poverty, the reintegration of the marginalised, support for the development of peoples, the breaking down of ethnic divisions and respect for life in all its stages.
The Church's mission is to spread hope "contagiously" among all peoples... It is only in this mission that the true journey of humanity is understood and attested.
In the month of October, the universal Church highlights her missionary vocation. Guided by the Holy Spirit she knows she is called to pursue the work of Jesus himself, proclaiming the Gospel of the Kingdom of God which is "righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit"
Mission is a workshop where there is room for all.
An authentically eucharistic Church is a missionary Church... Truly, nothing is more beautiful than to know Christ and to make him known to others.
Being missionaries means loving God with all one's heart, even to the point, if necessary, of dying for him... Being missionaries means stooping down to the needs of all, like the Good Samaritan, especially those of the poorest and most destitute people.
The Church's mission is not political in nature. Her task is to open the world to the religious sense by proclaiming Christ.
Today, I, too, wish to reaffirm that I intend to continue on the path toward improved relations and friendship with the Jewish people, following the decisive lead given by John Paul II.
Today we bury his remains in the earth as a seed of immortality. Our hearts are full of sadness, yet at the same time of joyful hope and profound gratitude.
The real 'action' in the liturgy in which we are all supposed to participate is the action of God himself. This is what is new and distinctive about the Christian liturgy: God himself acts and does what is essential.
To me, it really seems visible today that ethics is not something exterior to the economy, which, as technical matter, could function on its own; rather, ethics is an interior principle of the economy itself, which cannot function if it does not take account of the human values of solidarity and reciprocal responsibility.
The life of the community, both domestically and internationally, clearly demonstrates that respect for rights, and the guarantees that follow from them, are measures of the common good that serve to evaluate the relationship between justice and injustice, development and poverty, security and conflict.
The Eucharistic sacrifice of the body and blood of Christ embraces in turn the mystery of our Lord's continuing passion in the members of his mystical body, the church in every age.
The Catholic tradition maintains that the objective norms governing right action are accessible to reason, prescinding from the content of revelation.
If a Pope clearly realizes that he is no longer physically, psychologically, and spiritually capable of handling the duties of his office, then he has a right and, under some circumstances, also an obligation to resign.
How much we need, in the church and in society, witnesses of the beauty of holiness, witnesses of the splendour of truth, witnesses of the joy and freedom born of a living relationship with Christ!
Each generation, as it seeks to advance the common good, must ask anew: 'What are the requirements that governments may reasonably impose upon citizens, and how far do they extend? By appeal to what authority can moral dilemmas be resolved?'
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