I dream of a church that is a mother and shepherdess.
Interpretation
Pope Francis envisions a church that nurtures and guides its community like a caring mother.
In this quote, Pope Francis expresses his desire for a church that embodies the qualities of maternal love and guidance. He imagines a church that offers support, care, and leadership to its followers, fostering a sense of belonging and protection, while nurturing their spiritual growth much like a mother would care for her children.
In practice
In a sermon about community care, you might say, 'As Pope Francis once envisioned, we should see the church as a mother and shepherdess nurturing our spirits.'
We are a church of sinners but we must not be afraid of holiness. Do not be afraid to aim for holiness and turn yourselves over to the love of God. Holiness does not mean performing extraordinary things but carrying out daily things in an extraordinary way that is with love, joy and faith.
I join the March for Life in Washington with my prayers. May God help us respect all life, especially the most vulnerable.
No one must say that they cannot be close to the poor because their own lifestyle demands more attention to other areas. This is an excuse commonly heard in academic, business or professional, and even ecclesial circles. While it is quite true that the essential vocation and mission of the lay faithful is to strive that earthly realities and all human activity may be transformed by the Gospel, none of us can think we are exempt from concern for the poor and for social justice
We face so many challenges in life: poverty, distress, humiliation, the struggle for justice, persecutions, the difficulty of daily conversion, the effort to remain faithful to our call to holiness, and many others. But if we open the door to Jesus and allow him to be part of our lives, if we share our joys and sorrows with him, then we will experience the peace and joy that only God, who is infinite love, can give.
More and more people work on Sundays as a consequence of the competitiveness imposed by a consumer society.
This Christmas may we be consistent in living the Gospel, welcoming Jesus into the centre of our lives.
He gazes through sunlight's buttresses, back down the refectory at the others, wallowing in their plenitude of bananas, thick palatals of their hunger lost somewhere in the stretch of morning between them and himself. A hundred miles of it, so suddenly. Solitude, even among the meshes of this war, can when it wishes so take him by the blind gut and touch, as now, possessively. Pirate's again some other side of a window, watching strangers eat breakfast.
God has reserved to Himself the right to determine the end of life, because He alone knows the goal to which it is His will to lead it. It is for Him alone to justify a life or to cast it away.
In the magical universe there are no coincidences and there are no accidents. Nothing happens unless someone wills it to happen. The dogma of science is that the will cannot possibly affect external forces, and I think thatβs just ridiculous. Itβs as bad as the church. My viewpoint is the exact contrary of the scientific viewpoint. I believe that if you run into somebody in the street itβs for a reason.
So long as you are ready to die for humanity, the life of your country is immortal.
Light griefs are plaintive , but great ones are dumb
Society cares about the individual only in so far as he is profitable. The young know this. Their anxiety as they enter in upon social life matches the anguish of the old as they are excluded from it.
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