BENEDICT XVI: NEWS, PAPAL TEXTS, PHOTOS AND COMMENTARY

See earlier entries for 5/11/10 on the preceding page.




MASS IN LISBON
Terreiro do Paco



Below, various views of Terreiro do Paco. The lower right photo shows how it opens towards the river.







200,000 attend the Pope's Mass
by Salvatore Izzo


LISBON, May 11, (Translated from AGI) - Some 200,000 faithful attended the Mass celebrated by Pope Benedict XVI this afternoon in the the heart of Lisbon.

The crowds overflowed from the Terreiro do Paco, Western Europe's largest public square, into the adjoining Plaza Restauradores and surrounding streets, where the faithful could follow the Mass on jumbo screens.

Terreiro do Paco was the site of the old royal palace complex that was destroyed in a catastrophic 1775 earthquake that was followed by a tidal wave and fires.

The altar-stage for the Mass was built on land that had been reclaimed along the left (south) bank of the Tagus river that flows by Lisbon as it empties into the Atlantic Ocean.



Across the Tagus, visible beyond the stage is the giant maountaintop statue of Christ the King, at its shrine in Almeda, whose 50th anniversary today was remembered by the Holy Father in a special message before the end of the Mass.

A sampling of the pictures of the event:











Here is teh Vatican's English trans;ation of the Holy Father's homily:

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Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Dear Young Friends,

“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations … teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age” (Mt 28:19-20).

These words of the risen Christ take on a particular significance in this city of Lisbon, from which generations upon generations of Christians – bishops, priests, consecrated and lay persons, men and women, young and not so young – have journeyed forth in great numbers in obedience to the Lord’s call, armed simply with the certainty that he had entrusted to them: “I am with you always”.

Portugal has gained a glorious place among the nations for the service rendered to the spreading of the faith: in all five continents there are local churches that owe their origin to Portuguese missionary activity.

In times past, your departure in search of other peoples neither impeded nor severed your bonds with what you were and what you believed. On the contrary, with Christian wisdom you succeeded in transplanting experiences and characteristic elements, opening yourselves up to the contribution of others so as to be yourselves, through an apparent weakness which is actually strength.

Today, as you play your part in building up the European Community, you offer the contribution of your cultural and religious identity. Indeed, just as Jesus Christ joined the disciples on the road to Emmaus, so today he walks with us in accordance with his promise: “I am with you always, to the close of the age.”

We too have a real and personal experience of the risen Lord, even if it differs from that of the Apostles. The distance of centuries is overcome and the risen Lord presents himself alive and at work, acting through us, in the Church and the world of today. This is our great joy.

In the living river of ecclesial Tradition, Christ is not two thousand years distant from us, but is really present among us: he gives us the Truth and he gives us the light which is our life and helps us find the path towards the future.

Present in his word, present in the assembly of the people of God with its Pastors, and pre-eminently present in the sacrament of his Body and Blood, Jesus is here with us.

I greet the Cardinal Patriarch of Lisbon, whom I thank for the affectionate words that he addressed to me at the start of the celebration, in the name of his community that has made me so welcome.

I in turn embrace the almost two million sons and daughters who form that community. To all of you here present – dear brother bishops and priests, beloved consecrated women and men and members of the lay faithful, dear families and young people, baptized and catechumens – I address my fraternal and friendly greeting, which I extend to those who are united with us through radio and television.

I warmly thank the President of the Republic for his presence, as well as the other authorities, especially the Mayor of Lisbon, who has been good enough to confer upon me the keys of the city.

Lisbon – friend, port and shelter for the great hopes that were placed in you by those who set off from here, hopes that were cherished by those who visited you – today I wish to make use of these keys that you have given me so that you may be able to base your human hopes upon divine Hope.

In the reading that has just been proclaimed, taken from the First Letter of Saint Peter, we heard: “Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone, a cornerstone chosen and precious, and he who believes in him will not be put to shame”.

And the Apostle explains: Draw near to the Lord, “that living stone, rejected by men but in God’s sight chosen and precious” (1 Pet 2:6,4).

Brothers and sisters, those who believe in Jesus will not be put to shame: he is the Word of God, who can neither deceive nor be deceived, and this Word is attested by a “great multitude which no man could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and tongues,” a multitude pictured by the author of the Apocalypse “clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands” (Rev 7:9).

This countless multitude includes not only Saints Verissimus, Maxima and Julia, martyred here during the persecution of Diocletian, Saint Vincent, deacon and martyr, the principal patron of the Patriarchate, Saint Anthony and Saint John of Brito who set off from here to sow God’s good seed in other lands and among other peoples, and Saint Nuno of Santa Maria, whom I added to the ranks of the Saints just over a year ago.

It is formed of the “servants of our God” from all times and places, on whose forehead the sign of the cross has been inscribed with “the seal of the living God” (Rev 7:2), that is to say, with the Holy Spirit.

I am referring to the initial rite administered to each one of us in the sacrament of Baptism, through which the Church gives birth to the “saints”.

We know that she also has quarrelsome and even rebellious sons and daughters, but it is in the saints that the Church recognizes her most characteristic features, it is in them that she tastes her deepest joy.

They all share the desire to incarnate the Gospel in their own lives, under the inspiration of the eternal animator of God’s People – the Holy Spirit.

Focussing her attention upon her own saints, this local Church has rightly concluded that today’s pastoral priority is to make each Christian man and woman a radiant presence of the Gospel perspective in the midst of the world, in the family, in culture, in the economy, in politics.

Often we are anxiously preoccupied with the social, cultural and political consequences of the faith, taking for granted that faith is present, which unfortunately is less and less realistic.

Perhaps we have placed an excessive trust in ecclesial structures and programmes, in the distribution of powers and functions; but what will happen if salt loses its flavour?

In order for this not to happen, it is necessary to proclaim anew with vigour and joy the event of the death and resurrection of Christ, the heart of Christianity, the fulcrum and mainstay of our faith, the firm lever of our certainties, the strong wind that sweeps away all fear and indecision, all doubt and human calculation.

The resurrection of Christ assures us that no adverse power will ever be able to destroy the Church. Therefore our faith is well-founded, but this faith needs to come alive in each one of us.

A vast effort at every level is required if every Christian is to be transformed into a witness capable of rendering account to all and at all times of the hope that inspires him (cf. 1 Pet 3:15): only Christ can fully satisfy the profound longings of every human heart and give answers to its most pressing questions concerning suffering, injustice and evil, concerning death and the life hereafter.

Dear brothers and sisters, dear young friends, Christ is always with us and always walks with his Church, accompanies her and guards her, as he has told us: “I am with you always, to the close of the age” (Mt 28:20).

Never doubt his presence! Always seek the Lord Jesus, grow in friendship with him, receive him in communion. Learn to listen to his word and also to recognize him in the poor. Live your lives with joy and enthusiasm, sure of his presence and of his unconditional, generous friendship, faithful even to death on the cross.

Bear witness to all of the joy that his strong yet gentle presence evokes, starting with your contemporaries. Tell them that it is beautiful to be a friend of Jesus and that it is well worth following him.

With your enthusiasm, demonstrate that, among all the different ways of life that the world today seems to offer us – apparently all on the same level – the only way in which we find the true meaning of life and hence true and lasting joy, is by following Jesus.

Seek daily the protection of Mary, Mother of the Lord and mirror of all holiness. She, the all-holy one, will help you to be faithful disciples of her Son Jesus Christ.

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As they promised, young Catholics of Lisbon 'serenaded' Pope Benedict XVI last night at the Apostolic Nunciature. AGI has a brief report on it...


Pope thanks young people,
'but now let me go to bed'
by Salvatore Izzo




LISBON, May 11 (Translated from AGI) - "You have come to wish me 'Good night' and I thank you from the heart. But now you must let me go to bed, or the night won't be good, and tomorrow awaits us".

With these words, Benedict XVI said 'good night' to the young people who came to sing for him in front of the Apostolic Nunciature.

"Dear friends," he told them, "I appreciated the lively and numerous participation of young people at the Eucharistic celebration this afternoon at Terreiro do Paco, manifesting their faith and their desire to construct a future on the Gospel of Christ.

"Thank you for the joyous witness that you offer Christ, he who is eternally young, and for the attention you have shown to his poor Vicar on earth with this evening encounter".

He also said:

"I feel great joy that I will be able to join the multitudes of pilgrims to Fatima on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the beatification of Francisco and Jacinta.

"The three children, with the help of Our Lady, learned to see the light of God in their innermost heart and to adore him during their lifetime. May the Virgin Mary obtain the same grace for you and watch over you.

"I continue to count on you and on your prayers so that this visit to Portugal may bear much fruit".

Too bad the reporter did not give any background on the young people who organized this, or on how many turned up... Maybe I'll find something in the Portuguese papers, which I have not even begun to look at!

P.S. I did find a few more details from the official website, plus the photo below:



Some 9,000 young people from the organization 'Eu acredito' (I Believe') marched after the Mass at Terreiro do Paco to the Apostolic Nunciature for a prayer rally, singing hymns, and eventually 'serenading' the Pope.

The Pope appeared at one of the windows facing the street at 9:33 p.m. and addressed them for about five minutes, interrupted many times by applause.

They laughed when he said, "Now let me go to sleep". He ended his message to them by saying, "Boa noite! Até amanhã! Obrigado!" (Good night1 Until tomorrow! Thank you!" - which provoked a new wave of applause.





The Pope's first day in Portugal was definitely one of the most memorable of his 15 international trips so far. Popular participation in all the events demonstrated yet again the strong residual - if not fundamental - formative influence of Catholicism on generations of Portuguese. An influence that in some ways resists the Euro-conforming homogenizing secularization of Portuguese society. [The beautiful, intensely participated Mass was made even more exceptionally memorable by the backdrop of river and distant hills. It was a spectacular tableau in more ways than one.]

My biggest frustration is the way MSM has chosen to depict the Holy Father's words from his inflight news conference. Their reports and headlines all make three fallacious points:

1. That Benedict XVI is saying these things ('sins of the Church' and 'attacks from within') for the first time.

What were the March 2009 Letter to the Bishops of the World or the March 21 Pastoral Letter to Irish Catholics, to name the two most seminal documents but that?]?

And what has he been telling bishops visiting him ad limina but that - the Austrians, the Swiss, the Irish, to name a few - at various occasions since he became Pope?

What has he been saying in various homilies every chance he gets? In an off-the-cuff lectio divina to Roman seminarians last year, he first used St. Paul's admonition to the Corinthians against 'biting and devouring each other' to the point of destroying themselves.

The facile headline-making conclusion agreed upon by MSM - in almost identical wordings in their respective reports - on the Pope's words yesterday simply indicate that they have not been listening or reading this Pope. Or, more likely, they only hear and read what they want to when they want to.

2. That the statements inflight yesterday were 'the most thorough admission of guilt' by the Pope. Again, the same arguments apply.

3. That until now, 'the Vatican has blamed the media for the current crisis' and now the Pope 'admits that the Church itself is to blame'. What a dishonest way to try and turn the tables!

No one in the Vatican has ever blamed the media for anything other than one-sided, disproportionate, and often false or tendentiously accusatory reporting of the issue, the latter especially in the case of allegations regarding the Pope himself personally.

The Vatican Press Office, which is the only agency that peaks for the Holy See, has only ever rebutted media reports that directly impugned Cardinal Ratzinger/Benedict XVI.

No, the MSM are simply trying to reinforce their storyline during this current phase of the 'scandal'.

What happened was that they did not expect the Pope's letter to the Irish Catholics to be so comprehensive and direct that they chose to drop it like a hot potato since it didn't serve their purpose - the letter made it painfully clear that this Pope is acutely aware of the problem and trying to do something constructive about it, but "Hey, wait a minute, that's not what we in the media have been saying, so let's pretend he never wrote it!"

How long did their reporting of the Irish Letter last? A couple of days - and then, they decided instead to go after him personally.

One week after the letter was published - and immediately became a forgotten entity in the media - came the first stories about Munich, followed within a few days by the Murphy case in Milwaukee, and the Kiesle case in Oakland... All the while, they were wallowing in sanctimony and saying, "Why is the Pope silent about all this?" When everything that had to be said about pervert priests and the harm they have done and are doing to their victims and to the Church had been said in the Irish Letter - that no one, even in all the stories yesterday, ever once referred to again!

Then everyone seizes on a widely mistranslated term used by Cardinal Sodano in a statement of tribute and support for the Pope to say that 'the Vatican' considers the news reporting on priestly abuse as nothing more than 'petty gossip".

And even a learned and eminent man like Cardinal Schoenborn, who knows Italian and who should know better, in any case, picks it up and bounces it back to the media with an even worst spin - that it was an insult to the victims!

So now, with the entirely gratuitous help of someone like Schoenborn, the MSM have even more reason to beat their breasts "Me Tarzan, you monkeys!' and gloat that they have been the shining knights in armor against a wicked Church and Pope who have refused to admit their sins until - TA-DAH! - brought to their knees all of a sudden as evidenced by Benedict XVI's statements on the plane yesterday.

I haven't stopped barfing, excuse me, since yesterday!


P.S. A most important circumstance that no one - certainly not in MSM, and hardly ever from what I have seen among Catholic writers - is the fact that Benedict XVI on his own volition decreed the Year for Priests. One of his motivations was obviously the presence of filth in the Church which he refers to very discreetly as the third category of priests that the Year for Priests is aimed at. The letter announcing the Year for Priests to his brother priests is very much worth re-reading.

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He opens with this:

On the forthcoming Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, Friday 19 June 2009 – a day traditionally devoted to prayer for the sanctification of the clergy – I have decided to inaugurate a “Year for Priests” in celebration of the 150th anniversary of the “dies natalis” of Jean Marie Vianney, the patron saint of parish priests worldwide.

This Year, meant to deepen the commitment of all priests to interior renewal for the sake of a stronger and more incisive witness to the Gospel in today’s world, will conclude on the same Solemnity in 2010. "The priesthood is the love of the heart of Jesus”, the saintly Curé of Ars would often say.

This touching expression makes us reflect, first of all, with heartfelt gratitude on the immense gift which priests represent, not only for the Church, but also for humanity itself. I think of all those priests who quietly present Christ’s words and actions each day to the faithful and to the whole world, striving to be one with the Lord in their thoughts and their will, their sentiments and their style of life.

How can I not pay tribute to their apostolic labours, their tireless and hidden service, their universal charity? And how can I not praise the courageous fidelity of so many priests who, even amid difficulties and incomprehension, remain faithful to their vocation as “friends of Christ”, whom he has called by name, chosen and sent?...

I also think of the countless situations of suffering endured by many priests, either because they themselves share in the manifold human experience of pain or because they encounter misunderstanding from the very persons to whom they minister. How can we not also think of all those priests who are offended in their dignity, obstructed in their mission and persecuted, even at times to offering the supreme testimony of their own blood?

There are also, sad to say, situations which can never be sufficiently deplored where the Church herself suffers as a consequence of infidelity on the part of some of her ministers. Then it is the world which finds grounds for scandal and rejection. What is most helpful to the Church in such cases is not only a frank and complete acknowledgment of the weaknesses of her ministers, but also a joyful and renewed realization of the greatness of God’s gift, embodied in the splendid example of generous pastors, religious afire with love for God and for souls, and insightful, patient spiritual guides. Here the teaching and example of Saint John Mary Vianney can serve as a significant point of reference for us all...

Referring to how the saint observed chastity, he said:

His chastity, too, was that demanded of a priest for his ministry. It could be said that it was a chastity suited to one who must daily touch the Eucharist, who contemplates it blissfully and with that same bliss offers it to his flock. It was said of him that “he radiated chastity”; the faithful would see this when he turned and gazed at the tabernacle with loving eyes”.

He ended by saying:

To the Most Holy Virgin I entrust this Year for Priests. I ask her to awaken in the heart of every priest a generous and renewed commitment to the ideal of complete self-oblation to Christ and the Church which inspired the thoughts and actions of the saintly Curé of Ars.

It was his fervent prayer life and his impassioned love of Christ Crucified that enabled John Mary Vianney to grow daily in his total self-oblation to God and the Church.

May his example lead all priests to offer that witness of unity with their Bishop, with one another and with the lay faithful, which today, as ever, is so necessary.

Despite all the evil present in our world, the words which Christ spoke to his Apostles in the Upper Room continue to inspire us: “In the world you have tribulation; but take courage, I have overcome the world” (Jn 16:33).

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THE POPE'S DAY

Day 2:
MEETING WITH PORTUGAL'S
'WORLD OF CULTURE'
Centro Cultural Belem

'Be navigators of truth, beauty, goodness'



(12 May 10 – RV) Striking modern architecture close to the waterfront was the backdrop for Pope Benedict’s encounter with the World of Culture on the second morning of his Apostolic visit to Portugal .

The Belem Cultural Centre, built to host Portugal's presidency of the European Union in 1992, is also an arts complex with the city's largest auditorium.





And in this auditorium Pope Benedict XVI was greeted by all present with unusual cheering from this kind of high brow audience An audience which included representatives from the entire diplomatic corps on Portuguese soil.

Also present were representatives of the Jewish, Muslim and Hindu community as well as members of the Portuguese Evangelical Alliance, and of the Ishmaelite Community.

The Holy Father was welcomed by the President of the Commission for Culture of the Portuguese Bishop’s conference, Bishop Manuel de Clemente, who willll also be acting as his host as Bishop of Porto on the final day of this four day apostolic journey .

A Bishop recently presented with the prestigious Pessoa award for his contribution to culture in Portugal, a significant gesture given the Church in Portugal was once distant from culture because of past anti-clericalism.

But another Manuel was there to greet the Pope, acting as dean for the cultural world in Portugal. A famous film director whose surname is de Oliveira, who will be presenting his latest work at the forthcoming Cannes festival.

For once perhaps the Pope could llisten to the wise words of someone older than he. Now 102, de Oliveira is a Jesuit educated Catholic. And while religion takes centre stage in his films, he admits to never having read anything the Holy Father has written.

When he spoke he highlighted how from the beginning arts and religion have been linked to Christianity; “The roots of Europe and Portugal, whether we like it or not, are Christian - he mentioned -and have inspired a wealth of artistic masterpieces”.


Oliveira makes another auspicious model of longevity, and looking exceptionally well, too, for 102..

And at the end of his brief speech Benedict XVI got up from his chair to shake his hands and the film director bowed as he presented a gift from the world of culture, a silver box in the shape of an egg with a porcelain dove inside, symbolic of peace and of the holy spirit.

The Pope responded giving his address in Portuguese, thanking him personally for his kind words, for having given him a glimpse of the concerns and mood of the soul of Portugal in this turbulent period of the life of society.

Here is the English translation of the Pope's address:

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Dear Brother Bishops,
Distinguished Authorities,
Eminent representatives of the arts and sciences,
Dear friends,

I am very pleased to meet you, men and women devoted to research and expansion in the various fields of knowledge, and worthy representatives of the rich world of culture in Portugal.

I take this occasion to express my deep esteem and appreciation of you and your work. The Government, represented here by the Minister for Culture, to whom I extend my respectful and warm greetings, gives praiseworthy support to the national priorities of the world of culture.

I am grateful to all those who have made this meeting possible, particularly the Cultural Commission of the Bishops’ Conference and its President, Bishop Manuel Clemente, whom I thank for his kind words of welcome and his presentation of the multifaceted reality of Portuguese culture, represented here by some of its most distinguished leaders.

Their sentiments and expectations have been expressed by film director Manoel de Oliveira, a man venerable in years and in professional activity, to whom I extend my affectionate greetings and esteem. I also thank him for his kind words, which have given a glimpse of the concerns and the mood of the soul of Portugal in this turbulent period of the life of society.

Today’s culture is in fact permeated by a “tension” which at times takes the form of a “conflict” between the present and tradition. The dynamic movement of society gives absolute value to the present, isolating it from the cultural legacy of the past, without attempting to trace a path for the future.

This emphasis on the “present” as a source of inspiration for the meaning of life, both individual and social, nonetheless clashes with the powerful cultural tradition of the Portuguese people, deeply marked by the millenary influence of Christianity and by a sense of global responsibility.

This came to the fore in the adventure of the Discoveries and in the missionary zeal which shared the gift of faith with other peoples. The Christian ideal of universality and fraternity inspired this common adventure, even though influences from the Enlightenment and laicism also made themselves felt.

This tradition gave rise to what could be called a “wisdom”, that is to say, an understanding of life and history which included a corpus of ethical values and an “ideal” to be realized by Portugal, which has always sought to establish relations with the rest of the world.

The Church appears as the champion of a healthy and lofty tradition, whose rich contribution she sets at the service of society. Society continues to respect and appreciate her service to the common good but distances itself from that “wisdom” which is part of her legacy.

This “conflict” between tradition and the present finds expression in the crisis of truth, yet only truth can provide direction and trace the path of a fulfilled existence both for individuals and for a people.

Indeed, a people no longer conscious of its own truth ends up by being lost in the maze of time and history, deprived of clearly defined values and lacking great and clearly formulated goals.

Dear friends, much still needs to be learned about the form in which the Church takes her place in the world, helping society to understand that the proclamation of truth is a service which she offers to society, and opening new horizons for the future, horizons of grandeur and dignity.

The Church, in effect, has “a mission of truth to accomplish, in every time and circumstance, for a society that is attuned to man, to his dignity, to his vocation. […] Fidelity to man requires fidelity to the truth, which alone is the guarantee of freedom (cf. Jn 8:32) and of the possibility of integral human development.

For this reason the Church searches for truth, proclaims it tirelessly and recognizes it wherever it is manifested. This mission of truth is something that the Church can never renounce” (Caritas in Veritate, 9).

For a society made up mainly of Catholics, and whose culture has been profoundly marked by Christianity, the search for truth apart from Christ proves dramatic. For Christians, Truth is divine; it is the eternal “Logos” which found human expression in Jesus Christ, who could objectively state: “I am the truth” (Jn 14:6).

The Church, in her adherence to the eternal character of truth, is in the process of learning how to live with respect for other “truths” and for the truth of others. Through this respect, open to dialogue, new doors can be opened to the transmission of truth.

“The Church – wrote Pope Paul VI – must enter into dialogue with the world in which she lives. The Church becomes word, she becomes message, she becomes dialogue” (Ecclesiam Suam, 67).

Dialogue, without ambiguity and marked by respect for those taking part, is a priority in today’s world, and the Church does not intend to withdraw from it.

A testimony to this is the Holy See’s presence in several international organizations, as for example her presence at the Council of Europe’s North-South Centre, established 20 years ago here in Lisbon, which is focused on intercultural dialogue with a view to promoting cooperation between Europe, the southern Mediterranean and Africa, and building a global citizenship based on human rights and civic responsibility, independent of ethnic origin or political allegiance, and respectful of religious beliefs.

Given the reality of cultural diversity, people need not only to accept the existence of the culture of others, but also to aspire to be enriched by it and to offer to it whatever they possess that is good, true and beautiful.

Ours is a time which calls for the best of our efforts, prophetic courage and a renewed capacity to “point out new worlds to the world”, to use the words of your national poet (Luís de Camões, Os Lusíades, II, 45).

You who are representatives of culture in all its forms, forgers of thought and opinion, “thanks to your talent, have the opportunity to speak to the heart of humanity, to touch individual and collective sensibilities, to call forth dreams and hopes, to broaden the horizons of knowledge and of human engagement. […] Do not be afraid to approach the first and last source of beauty, to enter into dialogue with believers, with those who, like yourselves, consider that they are pilgrims in this world and in history towards infinite Beauty!” (Address to Artists, 21 November 2009).

Precisely so as “to place the modern world in contact with the life-giving and perennial energies of the Gospel” (John XXIII, Apostolic Constitution Humanae Salutis, 3), the Second Vatican Council was convened.

There, the Church, on the basis of a renewed awareness of the Catholic tradition, took seriously and discerned, transformed and overcame the fundamental critiques that gave rise to the modern world, the Reformation and the Enlightenment.

In this way the Church herself accepted and refashioned the best of the requirements of modernity by transcending them on the one hand, and on the other by avoiding their errors and dead ends.

The Council laid the foundation for an authentic Catholic renewal and for a new civilization – “the civilization of love” – as an evangelical service to man and society.

Dear friends, the Church considers that her most important mission in today’s culture is to keep alive the search for truth, and consequently for God; to bring people to look beyond penultimate realities and to seek those that are ultimate.

I invite you to deepen your knowledge of God as he has revealed himself in Jesus Christ for our complete fulfilment. Produce beautiful things, but above all make your lives places of beauty.

May Our Lady of Belém intercede for you, she who has been venerated down through the centuries by navigators, and is venerated today by the navigators of Goodness, Truth and Beauty.

---

The AP account completely overlooks what the Pope said about Vatican-II:

Pope urges Portugal
to rediscover Christian roots
By NICOLE WINFIELD


LISBON, Portugal, May 12 (AP) – Pope Benedict XVI recalled Portugal's glorious past as a country of adventurers and missionaries who spread Catholicism around the globe in urging a rediscovery of its Christian heritage Wednesday — a key theme of his message to an increasingly secularized Europe.

Benedict met with members of Portugal's cultural elite on the second day of his visit, a day after making his most explicit admission of the Church's own guilt in the clerical abuse scandal. Later Wednesday, he arrives in Fatima, the heart of the trip, to pray at the famous shrine beloved by Pope John Paul II.

Like many countries in western Europe, Portugal has strayed far from its Catholic roots, passing laws in recent years allowing abortion on demand and divorce, even when one of the spouses is opposed.

Earlier this year, Parliament passed a bill seeking to make the country the sixth in Europe allowing same-sex couples to marry. The country's President must now decide whether to approve or veto the legislation.

The German-born Benedict has made clear his dissatisfaction with such trends in Europe and has made it a priority of his papacy to remind Europeans that Christianity forms a basis of much of their culture and identity, and that they shouldn't try to do without God in their lives. Over a five-year-papacy, nine of Benedict's 15 foreign trips have been in Europe.

In a speech to Portuguese artists, scientists and intellectuals, Benedict warned that if Christians ignore their faith "they end up lost in the labyrinth of time and history, deprived of clearly defined values and grand ambitions."

"For a society largely created by Catholics and whose culture was profoundly marked by Christianity, the attempt to find truth without Jesus Christ is dramatic," he said.

He recalled the sense of adventure that marked Portugal's colonial past, when its explorers and missionaries brought Catholicism to Africa, Asia and South America, saying they did so with a "sense of global responsibility."

He lamented that today there is increasingly a sense of tension and conflict between current trends in culture and the traditions of the past, and urged Portugal's cultural elite in particular to use their influence to promote a renewed appreciation of Christianity.

Benedict met later with Portugal's Socialist Prime Minister Jose Socrates, who in recent years has been a driving force behind the efforts to introduce abortion on demand and same-sex marriage.

Socrates said he told the Pontiff that church institutions played an important role in Portugal, especially in welfare programs for the needy.

"The link between the state and the church has been very important in efforts to address social concerns," Socrates told reporters.

Later Wednesday, Benedict heads to Fatima, the site where three Portuguese shepherd children reported having visions of the Virgin Mary in 1917. The shrine draws millions of pilgrims a year and was a favorite of John Paul, who made his third and final visit in 2000 when he beatified two of the three shepherds.

During that visit, the Vatican revealed the so-called third secret of Fatima, the third part of the message the Virgin allegedly told the children on May 13, 1917: a description of the May 13, 1981, assassination attempt on John Paul.

Struck by the coincidence of the dates, John Paul believed the Virgin intervened to spare his life after a Turkish gunman fired on him in St. Peter's Square. In gratitude, he gave the bullet extracted from his wound to the Fatima shrine, and it now adorns the crown of a statue of the Virgin where Benedict will pray Wednesday evening.

En route to Portugal on Tuesday, Benedict was asked if the suffering of the Pope contained in the third secret could be extended to encompass the suffering of the Church today concerning the clerical abuse scandal.

Benedict affirmed it could, arguing that the Fatima message doesn't respond to a particular situation or time but offers a "fundamental response" to the constant need for penance and prayer.

"In terms of what we today can discover in this message, attacks against the Pope or the Church don't come just from outside the Church," he told reporters on board the papal airplane. "The suffering of the Church also comes from within the Church, because sin exists in the Church. This, too, has always been known, but today we see it in a really terrifying way."

[In no way can his statement be made to read that he is blaming the Church alone - more precisely, some persons who make up the Church - for the problem, as all the media reports have it.]

Priestly abuses are comparable
to the 'bullets and arrows'
aimed at the Church from without
by Vittorio Messori
Translated from

May 12, 2010


In the vast and sometimes disquieting ranks of the 'Fatimisti', there must be ferment now to show that Benedict XVI has betrayed himself - belying Cardinal Ratzinger who was alongside John Paul II in disclosing the mythical Third Secret.

Countless words have accumulated since 2000 when Cardinal Angelo Sodano read out the text of teh Third Secret for the first time in Fatima, beside John Paul II who had just beatified the seer children Jacinta and Francisco.

Books, pamphlets, articles, TV inquiries have sustained since then, with a cascade of arguments that the Wojtyla-Ratzinger duo have deceived us - that the secret is something else and concerns the Church after Vatican II.

Some, in order to attenuate the blame on the distinguished 'deceivers' - the Pope, the Prefect of the Faith, Sor Lucia herself who made a written confirmation of what they disclosed - have hypothesized that it was reticence, holding back, rather than deception.

In short, that they amputated the text revealed. What they disclosed is true but a part exists that remains hidden in order not to detract from the prestige of Vatican II, in order not to place the responsibility for an ecclesial catastrophe on the Council.

A catastrophe from within, that is, while the Vatican would make us believe that the enemies of the Church are only external. They would remind us of the dramatic scene described by Sor Lucia: "The Holy Father, on his knees at the foot of a great Cross, is killed by a group of soldiers who fire various firearms and arrows at him, while other bishops, priests, religious men and women and various lay persons of various classes and positions are killed in the same way".

And now, here comes Benedict XVI, answering a question from newsmen, places the scandal of priestly pederasty as among the ills that in some way had been predicted by the message of Fatima.

An attack against the Gospel that comes from within, from the priests, sometimes from the Church hierarchy itself: thus, a crisis of faith, a disaster that is the outcome of the devastation of the Church by Vatican II. Precisely that which is alleged that the Church has withheld from the text of the Third Secret.

Whoever has this interpretation could not have seen the words of Papa Ratzinger in their entirety. The persecution referred to in the Message of Fatima, the Pope pointed out, can come from outside the Church, as the Third Secret text says, but also from within.

The 'sufferings' of the Catholic Church, starting with the murderous (media) attacks on the Pope, are inflicted by some who are 'outside' the Church but also by those who are 'within' it.

The offenses by priests, in the eyes of the head of the Church, are comparable to the 'bullets and arrows' launched by non-believers [and detractors!].

The worst persecutors are often among the so-called disciples of the Gospel who have actually betrayed it, defying the words of Jesus. Thus it is, the Pope reiterates, that the word "Penitence!" repeated three times by the angels in the Third Secret, is an appeal to the Church that she should not only fear her external foes but also attend to purifying herself.

But these are words that are said in vain for those who insist that the Vatican is guilty of misrepresentation. [Even worse, it means nothing to those who would like nothing better than to bring the Church down - in a way analogous to how Woodward and Bernstein brought the downfall of Nixon.]

Allow me therefore, to make a personal testimony, in order to understand this milieu better.

During the 24 hours of one-on-one conversations [in 1984] that led to the book Rapporto sulla fede [published in English as The Ratzinger Report], I asked Cardinal Ratzinger if he had read the Third Secret.

"Yes, I have," was his prompt and dry reply. Naturally, I pursued the question, obviously without obtaining a disclosure of the contents, but he did make some significant statements.

The book was published in June 1985, but the previous November, some advance excerpts, among them the part about Fatima, were published in the monthly magazine Jesus [published in Italian by Edizioni San Paolo].

In the passage from the advance reports in Jesus to what eventually appeared in the book, I reviewed everything by myself, with full liberty, since I knew that the cardinal would examine every line before approving it for printing.

So, in the account of the Third Secret, as I did with the rest, here and there, I changed an adjective, omitted a word, added or inserted a more specific word, etc. - in the interests of consistency, style and readability.

Ultimately, Ratzinger read the draft and approved it, and, in the specific text on Fatima, without any changes. Well, 25 years have passed since then, and even today, a mass of books, investigations and articles in various languages continue to appear, where pages are dedicated to comparing the words of the cardinal as printed in the magazine and what he says in the book. Differences that the Fatimists claim to be proof of strategies, plots, cover-ups, vendettas, on the part of powerful 'heads'.

Fatima is only one example. The phenomenon has attracted not just devotees but also 'visionaries', conspiracy theorists, supposed behind-the-scenes experts.

But all of them forget that the ultimate message of Fatima is quite simple and can be summarized in two words: Prayer and penitence.


I obviously have not seen the documentary, and I have yet to read a review of it, but from the title, it appears that the RAI documentary aired last Sunday in anticipation of the Pope's visit was clear about the message of Fatima:

It figures because Giuseppe De Carli, RAI's Vatican bureau chief, was the interviewer in Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone's book-length interview about the Third Secret.

I must admit I am very grateful that the nuns who taught me religion in the grades - 'Religion' was formally a subject in the curriculum of Catholic schools then, and one was graded on it and given 'academic' recognition; a schoolchild's greatest glory was to win at year's end, the gold medal trifecta for excellence in 'studies', 'religion' and 'conduct' - only ever emphasized that the message of Fatima was 'penitence and prayer', the same message transmitted to us by all the Catholic visionaries who have ever been chosen to convey messages from heaven.

Assuming for a moment that the Vatican has suppressed part of the Third Secret - and the reasons given for such suppression are absurd - the Fatimists claim that the suppressed part has "terrible words on the crisis of the faith, on betrayal on the part of the hierarchy, on catastrophic events in store for the Church and, with it, the whole of humanity". What would be so surprising about that?

All thinking Catholics have known it from experience for the past 40 years, and we have seen 'catastrophic' things for the faith and even for 'the whole of humanity' - such as suppression of Christians in Muslim countries, the advances made by same-sex marriage and euthanasia in so-called civilized societies, teh post-Concilar chaos and its effect on Catholic values, and lately, the disclosure of priestly perversion that has given media the pretext to claim that a few worms have corrupted not just the entire barrel (all priests) but the entire crop of Catholics and Catholicism itself. In fact, the inordinate power of secular media is inevitably part of that catastrophe, which is the catastrophe of rampant secularization. Let me not forget the tens of millions of babies killed by widespread abortion, and the rampant disobedience to the Pope of many bishops and priests!

Nor is it the first time that the faith has been challenged in this way, though not on this scale. But believers who pray and give sincere witness of their belief in Christ by their own lives also know and trust that 'the gates of Hell shall not prevail'. And as the Pope himself said at the end of his answer yesterday, a part that the MSM did not and will not ever quote:

---

...We need to be realistic in expecting that evil will always attack, from within and from outside, but the forces of good are also always present, and finally the Lord is stronger than evil ,and the Virgin Mary is for us the visible maternal guarantee that the will of God is always the last word in history.

---

That is why the Vicar of Christ has the primary mission, wherever he is, to 'confirm his brothers in the faith' - to strengthen that faith, give reason for the Christian hope and affirm the primacy of charity in truth. And that is what Benedict XVI has been doing ceaselessly...

Day 2: MEETING WITH PORTUGUESE PRIME MINISTER
Apostolic Nunciature


L'Osservatore Romano released these photographs of the meeting:


Prime Minister Jose Socrates greets the Holy Father.










Socrates's delegation included Foreign Minister Luis Amado, left.

Socrates said afterwards he told the pontiff that Church institutions played an important role in Portugal, especially in welfare programs for the needy.

"The link between the state and the Church has been very important in efforts to address social concerns," Socrates told reporters.


Departure from the Nunciature
to leave for Fatima






Very convenient that this Nunciature has a 'Pope window'!


The route takern by the Popemobile to the airport is shown at right.



P.S. Salvatore Izzo at AGI filed a series of vignettes about the Pope's departure from Lisbon and arrival in Fatima with the kind of detail that, for some reason, other reporters think unimportant (since they never report it):


Affectionate crowds for the Pope -
in Lisbon and in Fatima
by Salvatore Izzo
Translated from



LISBON, May 12 (Translated from AGI) - One last crowd experience for Benedict XVI before leaving Lisbon, as he was greeted by a huge crowd that had gathered around the Apostolic Nunciature when he left this afternoon for the airport and the brief helicopter flight to Fatima.

First, the Pope showed himself at a balcony of the Nunciature to greet, thank and bless the crowd who responded with uncontainable enthusiasm.

Then to a new outburst of applause and affectionate chanting of his name, he emerged onto the street where he shook hands with all the staff of the Nunciature before getting into the Popemobile which took him to Portela airport.

Along the route to the airport, he was hailed by thousands more of faithful who had waited hours to see him pass by.

All Lisbon seems to have gone all out to show their affection for the Pope. For practically the whole six kilometers between the city center and the airport, the Popemobile passed through ranks of onlookers on both sides of the highway.

Images taken by the Portuguse state TV RTP were impressive - documenting the tens of thousands of people lining the Pope's route.

At Portela, the Pope boarded a Portufuese military helicopter for the quick hop to Fatima, only 110 kms. from Lisbon.

The Pope requested that the chopper fly by the giant statue of Christ the King, built 50 years ago and modelled on Rio de Janeiro's famous mountaintop statue.

The Shrine of Christ the King is in Almada, across the Tagus river from Lisbon, in the diocese of Setubal. A great crowd had assembled in the esplanade adjoining the Shrine to greet the Pope as his chopper made the flyby.

For days now, the statue has had a giant picture of the Pope on one side, with a giant vertical streamer reading 'Obrigado' (Thank you) on the other.

When the Pope's helicopter landed in Fatima at 4:20 p.m., the bells at the Shrine and all other churches in the diocese rang out to greet him.

After getting off the helicopter, the Pope had photographs taken with the military crew and then greeted the local authorities who welcomed him led by the Bishop of Leiria-Fatima, Mons, Antonio Marto; the Governor of Santarem province sonia Sanfona; tje president of the Municipal Council of Ourem, Paolo Fonseca, tne president of the Fatima council, Natalio Reis, and other authorities from teh civilian, military and police.

He then got into the Popemobile for the 5-km trip to the Shrine. And once again, as in Lisbon, the roadsides along the route were filled with uninterrupted ranks of pilgrims.

Day 2: ARRIVAL IN FATIMA



View of Fatima - the central tower of the Basilica of Our Lady (old basilica) stands out.



Vast crowd cheers Pope's
arrival in Fatima
By Daniel Silva


FATIMA, Portugal, May 12 (AFP) — Pope Benedict XVI arrived Wednesday at Fatima, one of Christianity's most popular shrines, cheered by tens of thousands of flag-waving pilgrims.

The 83-year old pontiff took a 30-minute helicopter ride from Lisbon before climbing into his Popemobile and heading for Fatima's Chapel of Apparitions, where the Pope was to pray before making an address to priests.

Benedict, the third Pope to visit Fatima, toured the shrine's vast esplanade, which turned into a sea of colour as the huge crowd waved yellow and white Vatican flags and hats, as well as the red and green of Portugal.

Chants of "Viva o Papa" rang round the crowd as the Popemobile reached the Chapel, built on the site where three shepherd children reported seeing visions of the Virgin Mary in 1917.

Benedict sank to his knees before a statue of the Virgin topped with a gold and silver crown in which John Paul II placed a bullet taken from his body following the failed assassination attempt in 1981.

Reciting a special prayer in remembrance of his predecessor, Benedict said "It is a profound consolation to know that you are crowned not only with the silver and gold of our joys and hopes, but also with the 'bullet' of our anxieties and sufferings."

Benedict's personal pilgrimage to the shrine, 120 kilometres (72 miles) northeast of Lisbon, is being billed by the Church as the highlight of his four-day visit and a giant outdoor Mass has been planned for as many as 500,000 people on Thursday.

While the Pontiff travelled by helicopter, Church authorities say some 40,000 pilgrims are expected to arrive in Fatima by foot from across Portugal for the mass.

Many will cover the last few hundred metres (yards) of their journey on their knees in gratitude for favours they believe were granted them by the Virgin.

"I have done this pilgrimage for 22 years because my daughter was at the doors of death and Our Lady granted me the miracle of saving her," said Maria de Fatima, a 47-year-old florist who trudged here from Castelo de Paiva, about 220 kilometres (135 miles) away.

Some 100,000 people are expected to take part in a mass celebrated at the shrine on Wednesday night by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican Secretary of State, and at a candlelight procession.

Just before the Mass the Pope will lead the faithful in praying the rosary.

Dozens of faithful gathered since early morning in the shrine's sprawling square amid unseasonably cool springtime weather. Some prayed quietly, others sang.

"I am going to stick it out no matter what. I want to see the pope up close," said Celestre Martins, 57, as she sat on a folding chair surrounded by bags containing food, water and other supplies.

Fatima represents the most spiritual part of the Pope's journey, hoping to have turned a corner on the sex scandals haunting the Church after making his strongest condemnation yet of paedophile priests.

While Benedict made the comments aboard his plane before the official start of his visit, he has concentrated since his arrival on what he sees as the Catholic Church's other pressing problem: Europe's growing secularism.

In his last public engagement in Lisbon before travelling to Fatima, he called on Portugal's cultural elite to help uphold the country's grand Christian tradition.

He also held a half-hour meeting with Portugal's Prime Minister Jose Socrates, a staunch defender of gay marriage legislation recently passed by the country's Parliament.

Pope Paul VI was the first Pope to visit the shrine, in 1967. John Paul, who credited Our Lady of Fatima with saving his life, visited Fatima in 1982, in 1991 and 2000.

He beatified two of the shepherd children, Francisco and Jacinta, 10 years ago on Thursday, when Benedict will celebrate the giant outdoor mass.

Their bodies have lain in the site's main basilica since 1957. Their cousin Lucia died in 2005 at the age of 97, and is also buried there.

Lucia said that the Virgin Mary had told the children three secrets. Two were revealed at the start of the 1940s, one described Hell, and the second a terrible conflict which some say were the two World Wars.

The third secret was revealed in May 2000 during John Paul II's final visit. According to the Church, it predicted the attack on the Pope in Rome in 1981.


The first papal event today was the Pope's visit to the Chapel of the Apparitions, when he offered a Golden Rose to the image of Our Lad. The chapel was built over the site where the Blessed Mother first appeared to the three children. It is a third of the way on the left side of the Esplanade, facing the Basilica, shown right from its right colonnade. The second event - Vespers and consecration of the priests and religious to the Virgin Mary - was held in the Basilica of the Most Holy Trinity.


In addition to the first Basilica of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary (left), built 1928-1953, a modern round Basilica of the Most Holy Trinity- directly across the splanade from the old one - was build in 2004 and consecrated by Cardinal Bertone in 2007. Below left, the new Basilica (during consturciton) in relation to the old; the Chapel of the Apparitions is enclosed in red.



There is a flood of pictures by now from Fatima, triple that of the Mass yesterday, so here are a few samples...

VISIT TO THE CHAPEL OF THE APPARITIONS
AND OFFERING THE GOLDEN ROSE









Pope recalls attempt to kill John Paul II
and other sufferings of the Church
by Nicole Winfield



FATIMA, Portugal, May 12 (AP) - Pope Benedict XVI travelled to the Catholic shrine of Fatima on Wednesday, recalling the assassination attempt on Pope John Paul II and other "sufferings" of the Church, which he has said included the Church sex abuse scandal.

Benedict didn't refer directly to the crisis a day after issuing his most explicit admission of the Church's own guilt. But he did remind priests and seminarians gathered at a Vespers service that they must remain loyal to their vocation and help one another when "there is a certain weakening of priestly ideals."

He thanked them for their dedication — "often silent and certainly not easy" — and urged them to seek out new recruits for the priesthood.

Benedict travelled to Fatima to mark the anniversary of the date — May 13, 1917 — when three Portuguese shepherd children reported having visions of the Virgin Mary. He will celebrate a Mass here Thursday to mark the anniversary of the visions and the 10th anniversary of the beatifications of two of the shepherds.

John Paul was also shot in St. Peter's Square on May 13, 1981 — a coincidence that led him to believe that the Virgin's "unseen hand" had "rescued him from death in the assassination attempt," Benedict said in a prayer at the shrine.

Benedict said John Paul had wanted to give the bullet that was extracted from his abdomen to the shrine as a measure of his gratitude; the bullet today forms part of the crown of the statue of the Virgin in a chapel here where Benedict prayed.

"It is a profound consolation to know that you are crowned not only with the silver and gold of our joys and hopes but also with the 'bullet' of our anxieties and sufferings," Benedict said.

After praying silently before the statue, he placed on it a golden rose — a symbol of papal gratitude since medieval times.

Turkish gunman Mehmet Ali Agca fired on John Paul in the Vatican's central square, gravely injuring him. While his motive remains unclear, he was convicted and served his sentence in Italy before being transferred to Turkey, where he was freed earlier this year after serving out the remainder of another sentence.

Agca had said he wanted to visit Fatima when Benedict was here; Portuguese government authorities asked him to postpone the visit, his lawyer said.

During John Paul's third and last visit in 2000, the Vatican revealed the so-called third secret of Fatima, the third part of the message the Virgin is said to have told the children: a description of the assassination attempt on John Paul. [Another example of journalistic shorthand that is extremely misleading. Once again, Winfield seems not to have read everything that Benedict XVI said on the plane yesterday other than, as she wrongly puts it, 'express admission of the Church's own guilt'. Although by now, I must get used to the fact that teh secular media use 'Church' indiscriminately to refer to people as well as the institution, which is a convenient way to tar everyone and everything connected with the Church every time negative things are mentioned.]

En route to Portugal on Tuesday, Benedict was asked if the suffering of John Paul contained in Fatima's third secret could be extended to encompass the suffering of the Church today concerning the clerical abuse scandal.

Benedict affirmed it could, arguing that the Fatima message doesn't respond to a particular situation or time but offers a "fundamental response" to the constant need for penance and prayer.

"In terms of what we today can discover in this message, attacks against the Pope or the Church don't come just from outside the church," he told reporters. "The suffering of the Church also comes from within the Church, because sin exists in the Church. This, too, has always been known, but today we see it in a really terrifying way."

[Well, thank you, Ms. Winfield, for including that particular statement by the Pope as is. Frankly, I wasn't expecting that of you. Maybe the Virgin of Fatima is working her grace...]

Many of the pilgrims attending Wednesday's service walked for days to reach Fatima, with some making the final marble stretch of several hundred meters (yards) up to the chapel on their knees in prayer. Many said Benedict's visit gave them hope, particularly as Portugal — western Europe's poorest country — confronts Europe's economic crisis.

"The Pope can inspire people to respect things like charity and loving thy neighbour and not being selfish," said Miguel Ferreira, a 39-year-old businessman who said he walked for days to Fatima.

But he added: "The Pope can only do so much. He can't hike pay."

Dozens of shops around the shrine selling religious-themed trinkets also offer imitation body parts in wax, such as limbs, hearts and ears, which the faithful cast into flames by the Chapel of the Apparitions with a prayer asking for the healing of their ailments.


If you have been to Fatima, the atmosphere of faith that is palpable inside that simple unpretentious chapel is truly awesome, spiritually uplifting in an indescribable manner, and if you are so minded, it can be life-changing, as in all of the major shrines at which Christians venerate.

Here is a translation of the prayer offered by the Holy Father at the Chapel of the Apparitions:

PRAYER TO OUR LADY OF FATIMA
by BENEDICT XVI

---

Our Lady
and Mother of all men and women,
here I am as a son
who comes to visit his Mother
in the company of
a multitude or brothers and sisters.
As Successor of Peter,
to whom has been entrusted
the mission of presiding in charity
in the Church of Christ
and to confirm all in the faith
and in hope,
I wish to present
to your Immaculate Heart
the joys and the hopes
as well as the problems and sufferings
of each of your sons and daughters
who are here in Cova di Iria
or who are with us from afar.

Most loving Mother,
console each one by name,
by face, and by his own story,
and look on everyone
with the maternal benevolence
that flows from the heart of God-Love himself.

I entrust and consecrate each and everyone to you,
Most Blessed Mother,
Mother of God and our Mother.

Choir and assembly: We sing to you and acclaim you, Mary! (v. 1)

The Venerable Pope John Paul II
who visited you here three times in Fatima,
and thanked that 'invisible hand'
which kept him from death
in the assassination attempt on May 13th
in St. Peter's Square almost 30 years ago,
offered to the Shrine of Fatima
the bullet which wounded him seriously,
which has been placed
on your crown as Queen of Peace.

It is a profound comfort
to know that you are crowned
not only with the silver and gold
of our joys and hopes,
but also with the 'bullet'
of our problems and sufferings.

I am thankful, beloved Mother,
for the prayers and sacrifices
that the three shepherd children
of Fatima offered for the Pope,
guided by the sentiments
that you inspired in them
in your apparitions.

I also thank all who, every day,
pray for the Successor of Peter
and his intentions
so that the Pope may be strong in faith,
daring in hope, and zealous in love.

Choir and assembly: We sing to you and acclaim you, Mary! (v. 2)

Mother beloved by all of us,
I offer to you here in your Shrine at Fatima,
the Golden Rose I brought from Rome
as a tribute of gratitude from the Pope
for the wonders that the Almighty
has done through you
in therts of so many who come as pilgrims
to this your maternal home.

I am sure that the Shepherds of Fatima -
Blessed Francisco and Blessed Jacinta,
and the Servant of God Lucia of Jesus -
are with us in this time
of supplication andf rejoicing.

Choir and assembly: We sing to you and acclaim you, Mary! (v. 5)

---

Day 2: VESPERS AND CONSECRATION
OF THE CLERGY AND REGLIGIOUS TO MARY
Igreja da Santissima Trinidade





THE HOLY FATHER'S HOMILY
English translation from

---

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

“When the time had fully come, God sent forth his Son born of woman, […] so that we might receive adoption as sons” (Gal 4:4,5).

The fullness of time came when the Eternal broke into time; by the grace of the Holy Spirit the Son of the Most High was conceived and became man in the womb of a woman, the Virgin Mary, lofty model of the believing Church.

The Church does not cease to beget new sons in the Son, whom the Father willed to be the first-born of many brothers. Each one of us is called to be with Mary and like Mary, a humble and simple sign of the Church who offers herself constantly as a spouse into the hands of her Lord.

To all of you who have given your life to Christ I wish to express this evening the Church’s appreciation and recognition. Thank you for your witness, often silent and certainly not easy; thank you for your fidelity to the Gospel and to the Church.

In Jesus, present in the Eucharist, I embrace my brothers in the priesthood and the deacons, the consecrated women and men, the seminarians and the members of the movements and new ecclesial communities present.

May the Lord reward, as he alone can and does, all those who have made it possible for us to gather together before the presence of Jesus in the Eucharist.

I mention especially the Episcopal Commission for Vocations and Ministries, with its President, Bishop António Santos, whom I thank for his greeting, full of collegial and fraternal affection, at the beginning of Vespers.

In this “upper room” of faith which is Fatima, the Virgin Mother shows us the way to place our pure and holy offering into the hands of the Father.

Let me open my heart and tell you that the greatest concern of every Christian, especially of every consecrated person or minister of the altar, must be fidelity, loyalty to one’s own vocation, as a disciple who wishes to follow the Lord.

Faithfulness over time is the name of love, of a consistent, true and profound love for Christ the Priest.

“Since Baptism is a true entry into the holiness of God through incorporation into Christ and the indwelling of his Spirit, it would be a contradiction to settle for a life of mediocrity, marked by a minimalistic ethic and a shallow religiosity” (John Paul II, Apostolic Letter Novo Millennio Ineunte, 31).

In this Year for Priests which is drawing to its close, may grace in abundance come down upon you that you may live joyfully your consecration and bear witness to your priestly fidelity grounded in the fidelity of Christ.

This evidently supposes true intimacy with Christ in prayer, since it is the powerful and intense experience of the Lord’s love that brings priests and consecrated persons to respond to his love in way that is exclusive and spousal.

This life of special consecration was born to keep the Gospel always before the People of God, as a reminder which manifests, certifies and proclaims to the whole Church the radical nature of the Gospel and the coming of the Kingdom.

Dear consecrated men and women, by your dedication to prayer, asceticism and growth in the spiritual life, to apostolic action and mission, you are progressing towards the heavenly Jerusalem, you are a foretaste of the eschatological Church, solid in her possession and loving contemplation of God who is love.

How much we need this witness today! Many of our brothers and sisters live as if there were nothing beyond this life, and without concern for their eternal salvation.

Men and women are called to know and love God, and the Church has the mission to assist them in this calling. We know well that God is the master of his gifts and that conversion is a grace. But we are responsible for proclaiming the faith, the whole faith, with all its demands.

Dear friends, let us imitate the Curé of Ars who prayed to the Lord in the following words: “Grant me the conversion of my parish, and I accept to suffer all that you wish for the rest of my life”.And he did everything to pull people away from their own lukewarm attitude in order to lead them back to love.

There exists a deep solidarity among all the members of the Body of Christ. It is not possible to love Christ without loving his brothers and sisters.

For their salvation Jean-Marie Vianney decided to become a priest: “to win souls for the good God”, as he said when, at eighteen years of age, he announced his vocation, just as Paul had said: “to win as many as I could” (1 Cor 9:19).

The Vicar General had told him [Vianney]: “There is not much love of God in the parish; you will bring it there”. In his priestly passion, this holy parish priest was merciful like Jesus in meeting each sinner.

He preferred to insist on the attractive aspect of virtue, on God’s mercy, in comparison to which our sins are like “grains of sand”. He pointed to the merciful love of God which had been offended.

He feared that priests would become “insensitive” and accustomed to the indifference of their faithful: “Woe to the Pastor – he would warn – who remains silent while God is offended and souls are lost”.

Dear brother priests, in this place, which Mary has made special, keep before your eyes her vocation as a faithful disciple of her Son Jesus from the moment of his conception to the Cross, and then beyond, along the path of the nascent Church, and consider the unheard-of grace of your priesthood.

Fidelity to one’s vocation requires courage and trust, but the Lord also wishes that you join forces: that you be concerned for one another and support one another fraternally.

Moments of common prayer and study, and sharing in the demands of the priestly life and work, are a necessary part of your life. It is a fine thing when you welcome one another into your homes with the peace of Christ in your hearts! It is important to assist one another with prayer, helpful advice and discernment!

Be especially attentive to those situations where there is a certain weakening of priestly ideals or dedication to activities not fully consonant with what is proper for a minister of Jesus Christ. Then is the time to take a firm stand, with an attitude of warm fraternal love, as brother assisting his brother to “remain on his feet”.

The priesthood of Christ is eternal (cf. Heb 5:6), but the life of priests is limited. Christ has willed that others continue in time the priestly ministry that he instituted.

Keep alive in your hearts, and in others around you, the desire to raise up – in cooperation with the grace of the Holy Spirit – new priestly vocations among the faithful.

Trustful and persevering prayer, joyful love of one’s own vocation and commitment to the work of spiritual direction will allow you to discern the charism of vocation in those whom God calls.

Dear seminarians, who have taken the first step towards the priesthood and are preparing in the major seminary or in houses of formation, the Pope encourages you to be conscious of the great responsibility which you will have to assume.

Carefully examine your intentions and your motivations. Devote yourselves with a steadfast heart and a generous spirit to your training.

The Eucharist, which is the centre of Christian life and the school of humility and service, should be your first love. Adoration, piety and care for the Most Holy Sacrament during these years of preparation will lead you one day to celebrate the Sacrifice of the Altar in an edifying and devout manner.

Along this path of fidelity, beloved priests and deacons, consecrated men and women, seminarians and committed lay persons, may the Blessed Virgin Mary guide us.

With her and like her, we are free so as to be saints;
- free so as to be poor, chaste and obedient;
- free for all because detached from all,
- free from self so that others may grow in Christ, the true Holy One of the Father and the Shepherd to whom priests, as his presence, lend their voice and their gestures;
- free to bring to today’s world Jesus who died and rose again, Jesus who remains with us until the end of time and who gives himself to all in the Most Holy Eucharist.

---

I always look forward to Benedict XVI's addresses to priests and religious because I can sense his person bes whenever he talks about what it means to be a priest, andd he never disappoints! Nor does he play to the grandstand at all.

It would have been the easiest thing for him to speak about the perverted priests who have brought such disgrace to the Church. But why should he do that when they constitute such an insignificant percentage of priests and religious who for the most part strive to live their vocations as true witnesses to Christ day by day despite being overburdened and never being free of material problems? Instead, the discreet exhortation to watch over each other so that those who appear to stray may be set right 'brother assisting brother to help him remain on his feet". Beautiful!

At the end of Vespers, the Holy Father read this Act of Consecration:

ACT OF ENTRUSTMENT AND CONSECRATION
of Priests and Religious to Our Lady of Fatima
English translation from

---

Immaculate Mother,
in this place of grace,
called together by the love of your Son Jesus
the Eternal High Priest, we,
sons in the Son and his priests,
consecrate ourselves to your maternal Heart,
in order to carry out faithfully the Father’s Will.

We are mindful that, without Jesus,
we can do nothing good (cf. Jn 15:5)
and that only through him, with him and in him,
will we be instruments of salvation
for the world.

Bride of the Holy Spirit,
obtain for us the inestimable gift
of transformation in Christ.
Through the same power of the Spirit that
overshadowed you,
making you the Mother of the Saviour,
help us to bring Christ your Son
to birth in ourselves too.
May the Church
be thus renewed by priests who are holy,
priests transfigured by the grace of him
who makes all things new.

Mother of Mercy,
it was your Son Jesus who called us
to become like him:
light of the world and salt of the earth
(cf. Mt 5:13-14).

Help us,
through your powerful intercession,
never to fall short of this sublime vocation,
nor to give way to our selfishness,
to the allurements of the world
and to the wiles of the Evil One.

Preserve us with your purity,
guard us with your humility
and enfold us with your maternal love
that is reflected in so many souls
consecrated to you,
who have become for us
true spiritual mothers.

Mother of the Church,
we priests want to be pastors
who do not feed themselves
but rather give themselves to God for their brethren,
finding their happiness in this.
Not only with words, but with our lives,
we want to repeat humbly,
day after day,
Our “here I am”.

Guided by you,
we want to be Apostles
of Divine Mercy,
glad to celebrate every day
the Holy Sacrifice of the Altar
and to offer to those who request it
the sacrament of Reconciliation.

Advocate and Mediatrix of grace,
you who are fully immersed
in the one universal mediation of Christ,
invoke upon us, from God,
a heart completely renewed
that loves God with all its strength
and serves mankind as you did.

Repeat to the Lord
your efficacious word:
“They have no wine” (Jn 2:3),
so that the Father and the Son will send upon us
a new outpouring of
the Holy Spirit.
Full of wonder and gratitude
at your continuing presence in our midst,
in the name of all priests
I too want to cry out:
“Why is this granted me,
that the mother of my Lord should come to me?” (Lk 1:43).

Our Mother for all time,
do not tire of “visiting us”,
consoling us, sustaining us.
Come to our aid
and deliver us from every danger
that threatens us.
With this act of entrustment and consecration,
we wish to welcome you
more deeply, more radically,
for ever and totally
into our human and priestly lives.

Let your presence cause new blooms to burst forth
in the desert of our loneliness,
let it cause the sun to shine on our darkness,
let it restore calm after the tempest,
so that all mankind shall see the salvation
of the Lord,
who has the name and the face of Jesus,
who is reflected in our hearts,
for ever united to yours!
Amen!

---

Here's a healthy and proper commentary on what the Pope said inflight yesterday... Of course, Brunelli is a veteran Vaticanista, but it's surprising how a couple of Italian Vaticanistas. including - SHOCK! - Andrea Tornielli, are echoing the MSM line that what the Pope said yesterday was 'his most completely admission so far of guilt within the Church'!

In March 2005, Cardinal Ratzinger was universally praised for speaking about the filth within the Church - there could not have been a clearer, more dramatic statement of culpability by some men of the Church done very effectively within a solemn Good Friday meditation and prayer. Also, MSM brings us back to the necessary distinction between the Church as constituted by Christ, an ideal, and the actual living Church that is necessarily 'una compagnia sempre riformanda'...


Benedict XVI's words are
a breath of fresh air
in an unbreathable climate
by Lucio Brunelli
Translated from

May 12, 2010


Yet again, in this difficult time for the Church, the words of Pope Benedict XVI come like a breath of fresh air.

Not only for the simple faithful, who may be dismayed by what they read or hear in the mass media, but even for those who look at the Church from afar and with a hypercritical eye, but who would themselves be unhappy if the Church were to to lose all credibility. {You think so? Certainly not the ones who are actively working to do just that!]

So, yesterday, on the flight to Portugal, Benedict XVI answered a question from the newsmen on the pedophile scandal and whether it could be read in the context of the message of Fatima. He said:

---

In terms of what we today can discover in this message, attacks against the Pope or the Church do not only come from outside; rather the sufferings of the Church come from within, from the sins that exist in the Church.

This too has always been known, but today we see it in a really terrifying way: the greatest persecution of the Church does not come from enemies on the outside, but is born from the sin within the church, the Church therefore has a deep need to re-learn penance, to accept purification, to learn on one hand forgiveness but also the need for justice.

Forgiveness is not a substitute for justice. In one word we have to re-learn these essentials: conversion, prayer, penance, and the theological virtues....

---

The simplicity and the truth of the Pope's words were liberating with regard to the climate lately - that has been made more unbreathable by a war among cardinals who are divided even on how best to 'defend' the Pope. Between those who would name names of 'guilty' Curial officials and those who would evoke external machinations.

Well, Benedict XVI has shown once again that he does not need defenders. He knows that in order to be true and convincing in the eyes of men, one only has to be true in the eyes of God.

It is to God, not to public opinion, that the conscience of the Pope and the entire Church must be accountable. This is a conviction that does not eliminate suffering but it makes him free and serene.

So the Pope is free and therefore able to see, more than just the malice of a media campaign, the gravity of the sins committed by men of the cloth. He has the serenity to tell everyone about the only medicine that Christians know can cure the evil that has been done: penitence, purification, forgiveness and justice...

It is these 'essentials' that the Church needs. Everything else confuses, distracts, alienates. Whether it takes the form of capricious polico-cultural hegemony or of mystical events.

Instead of allowing themselves to be impressed and guided by the essentiality of the Holy Father's words, some Catholics promptly fell back into the parlor game of interpreting the 'third secret' of Fatima, which John Paul II had disclosed in Fatima ten years ago tomorrow.

The only surviving seer, Sor Lucia, recalled a terrifying vision in which 'a bishop dressed in white' was killed by gunfire and arrows along with ranks of priests.

Benedict XVI, referring to the message of Our Lady of Fatima, yesterday emphasized the equally 'terrifying' consequences of sins committed by men of the Church.

That was all it took to revive the hypothesis that there is a 'fourth secret' deliberately held back under lock and key in some subterranean Vatican vault. It is supposed to be a prophecy of corruption and apostasy which the traditionalists have always identified with the post-Conciliar convulsions in the Church.

Those who knew Cardinal Ratzinger also know very well that he is 'allergic' to this kind of mystico-millenarian pietism. He has explained many times that the visions described by Sor Lucia, the supernatural message itself, are inevitably filtered and expressed through the sensibility, the temperament, and the historical context of the visionary.

"These visions are never simply 'photographs' of the future but carry in them the possibilities and limitations of the subject that perceives them." [From Cardinal Ratzinger's 2000 Theological Commentary on the Message of Fatima]

What really counts, the future Pope wrote, is the fundamental message - which is the announcement of a dramatically actual time of suffering for the Church, and the Mother of God's exhortation to penitence and conversion.

DAY 1 IN FATIMA
Thumbnail montage

I definitely won't be able to sort and format all the photos taken by the news agencies this afternoon and evening in Fatima tonight, and tomorrow is is a full day of events, but I think that just the thumbnails of today's photo bonanza are impressive in themselves - even if, as usual, the photographs of the rites themselves are scant and incomplete. And there are no long shots at all to give a general view of the crowds on the esplanade, except a couple during teh candelight procession!






Strangely, very few pictures were taken of the Vespers and Consecration service. The following five panels are mostly on the Rosary and candlelight procession that closed the evening:

May 13, Thursday, Sixth Week of Easter
SOLEMNITY OF THE ASCENSION
FEAST OF OUR LADY OF FATIMA


OR today.

On his second day in Portugal, the Pope underscores that
the Christian mission is an evangelical service to man and society:
'The Church in dialog with the truth of others'
Today's issue has reportage on the Papal Mass in Lisbon on Tuesday afternoon, the 'serenade' from 9,000 Portuguese youth who awaited the Holy Father at the Apostolic Nunciature after he got back from Mass (right photo, bottom panel), and his meeting with the world of arts and sciences in Lisbon yesterday morning. Center photo in the middle panel is the Christ the King Shrine in Almada, across the river from Lisbon - the Holy Father had a special message for its 50th anniversary after the Mass on Tuesday.



THE POPE'S DAY

Day 3: MASS IN FATIMA
Esplanade of the Shrine of Our Lady






Huge crowds gather for
Pope's Mass in Fatima
by Catherine Jouault






FATIMA, Portugal, May 13 (AFP) – Hundreds of thousands of people attended a giant mass with Pope Benedict XVI in Portugal Thursday in what the Church said was a massive show of support for his handling of the paedophile priest crisis.

The Fatima sanctuary's huge esplanade was full to overflowing and Church organisers said half a million people attended the outdoor mass, a greater number than joined Benedict's popular predecessor John Paul II here in 2000.

"As far the crisis and scandals are concerned, I think that the people wanted to show that they can distinguish between exceptions and the vast majority of their priests," Portuguese epispocal spokesman Manuel Morujao said.

Benedict himself appeared buoyed by the crowd, telling them of the "great hope which burns in my own heart, and which here, in Fatima, can be palpably felt."





The 83-year-old German Pontiff has often cut a dour, professorial figure when compared to his media-savvy Polish predecessor, but five years into his papacy he has proved a huge draw since his arrival in Portugal on Tuesday. [What is this ridiculous selective amnesia that MSM have about Benedict XVI? They always think it is the first time he says anything significant on whatever subject when he is the world's most prolific major theologian in terms of books, articles and documents. And they always seem to forget that he has always drawn huge crowds as Pope - in the Vatican or elsewhere. Why do they always seem to be surprised, or worse, to pretend it is the first time??? And when did Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI ever ever 'cut a dour professional figure' outside of the malicious imagination of the media????]

"I have come to Fatima to pray, in union with Mary and so many pilgrims, for our human family, afflicted as it is by various ills and sufferings," Benedict declared in his homily.

His Church has been engulfed in a series of unfolding sex abuse scandals amid allegations that the Vatican had wilfully protected paedophile priests from prosecution in several European countries and the United States. [Yada, yada, yada...]

A rock festival atmosphere unfolded ahead of the Pope's arrival for mass as flags flew, pilgrims climbed on statues of saints to get a view and the obligatory queues formed for toilets.

Thursday's Mass was the high point of a four-day visit to Portugal and rain fell on thousands who spent the night on the esplanade in sleeping bags -- and a lucky few under tents -- to make sure they got a place.

"People need something that gives them hope, there are many problems in the world and it is not surprising that there are so many people here," said Maria Caldeira, 66, wearing a transparent blue plastic raincoat against intermittent showers.

Earlier, the Pontiff blessed and kissed two swaddled babies thrust at him through the open window of his Popemobile, before stoking the crowd's enthusiasm by circling the esplanade on his way to the altar, smiling and waving to the massed ranks of flag and hat-waving pilgrims. [But circling the crowds in the Popemobile is SOP even in St. Peter's Square - not to stoke enthusiasm but to give everyone a chance to see the Pope closer, a papal act of consideration for the time and effort most of the pilgrims have taken to be there at all!]

Morujao said several factors were responsible for the massive turnout but mainly "the fact that the image given of the Pope has been unfair".

"I think that Christians wanted to send a message to say that the Pope, and this one in particular, is very much loved, and to say also that shyness is not a fault, but part of character."

The two-hour ceremony marked the 93rd anniversary of the Virgin Mary's reported apparitions to three shepherd children. The incident in 1917 led to the founding of the pilgrimage site, now one of Christianity's biggest.

A statue of Our Lady of Fatima, perched atop a bed of white roses and borne by soldiers, took centre stage behind a procession of bishops before the Mass began. Pilgrims threw rose petals at the statue as it passed by.

The late John Paul II credited the Virgin with deflecting an assassin's bullet in 1981 and placed a bullet taken from his body in the crown of the statue during a visit of thanksgiving the following year.

Official figures for John Paul II's last of three visits here in 2000 put that turnout at 400,000.

"According to what I've heard from several people used to making these estimations, including someone at the paramilitary police, there are around half-a-million people. Therefore more than in 2000," said Morujao.

[NB: The Portuguese newspapers, citing police figures, report that half a million pilgrims arrived in Fatima for the Feast Day of Our Lady and the Pope's visit - a record number for Fatima. Already last night, they turned out in those numbers for the candlelight procession, as they did again today for the Mass.]

Benedict has used his visit to warn Portugal of the consequences of increasing secularism in a country set to legalise gay marriage next week.

Nearly 90 percent of Portuguese are Catholic but only about 20 percent are practising.

He also issued a rallying call to priests, telling them on Wednesday to "take a firm stand" for their vocation.

The Pope said en route to Portugal that the problems the Church was facing came not ['not only' is the exact quote!] from its enemies, but from sin within the institution itself. And he said that justice for the victims of abuse must be a priority.






THE HOLY FATHER'S HOMILY
English translation from

---

Dear Pilgrims,

“Their descendants shall be renowned among the nations […], they are a people whom the Lord has blessed” (Is 61:9).

So the first reading of this Eucharist began, and its words are wonderfully fulfilled in this assembly devoutly gathered at the feet of Our Lady of Fatima.

Dearly beloved brothers and sisters, I too have come as a pilgrim to Fatima, to this “home” from which Mary chose to speak to us in modern times.

I have come to Fatima to rejoice in Mary’s presence and maternal protection.

I have come to Fatima, because today the pilgrim Church, willed by her Son as the instrument of evangelization and the sacrament of salvation, converges upon this place.

I have come to Fatima to pray, in union with Mary and so many pilgrims, for our human family, afflicted as it is by various ills and sufferings.

Finally, I have come to Fatima with the same sentiments as those of Blessed Francisco and Jacinta, and the Servant of God Lúcia, in order to entrust to Our Lady the intimate confession that “I love Jesus", that the Church and priests love him and desire to keep their gaze fixed upon him as this Year for Priests comes to its end, and in order to entrust to Mary’s maternal protection priests, consecrated men and women, missionaries and all those who by their good works make the House of God a place of welcome and charitable outreach.

These are the “people whom the Lord has blessed”. The people whom the Lord has blessed are you, the beloved Diocese of Leiria-Fatima, with your pastor, Bishop Antonio Marto. I thank him for his words of greeting at the beginning of Mass, and for the gracious hospitality shown particularly by his collaborators at this Shrine.

I greet the President of the Republic and the other authorities who serve this glorious Nation. I spiritually embrace all the Dioceses of Portugal, represented here by their Bishops, and I entrust to Heaven all the nations and peoples of the earth.

In God I embrace all their sons and daughters, particularly the afflicted or outcast, with the desire of bringing them that great hope which burns in my own heart, and which here, in Fatima, can be palpably felt.

May our great hope sink roots in the lives of each of you, dear pilgrims, and of all those who join us through the communications media.

Yes! The Lord, our great hope, is with us. In his merciful love, he offers a future to his people: a future of communion with himself.

After experiencing the mercy and consolation of God who did not forsake them along their wearisome return from the Babylonian Exile, the people of God cried out: “I greatly rejoice in the Lord, my whole being exults in my God” (Is 61:10).

The resplendent daughter of this people is the Virgin Mary of Nazareth who, clothed with grace and sweetly marvelling at God’s presence in her womb, made this joy and hope her own in the canticle of the Magnificat: “My spirit rejoices in God my Saviour”.

She did not view herself as a fortunate individual in the midst of a barren people, but prophecied for them the sweet joys of a wondrous maternity of God, for “his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation” (Lk 1:47, 50).

This holy place is the proof of it. In seven years you will return here to celebrate the centenary of the first visit made by the Lady “come from heaven”, the Teacher who introduced the little seers to a deep knowledge of the Love of the Blessed Trinity and led them to savour God himself as the most beautiful reality of human existence.

This experience of grace made them fall in love with God in Jesus, so much so that Jacinta could cry out: “How much I delight in telling Jesus that I love him! When I tell him this often, I feel as if I have a fire in my breast, yet it does not burn me”.

And Francisco could say: “What I liked most of all was seeing Our Lord in that light which Our Mother put into our hearts. I love God so much!” (Memoirs of Sister Lúcia, I, 42 and 126).

Brothers and sisters, in listening to these innocent and profound mystical confidences of the shepherd children, one might look at them with a touch of envy for what they were able to see, or with the disappointed resignation of someone who was not so fortunate, yet still demands to see.

To such persons, the Pope says, as does Jesus: “Is not this the reason you are wrong, that you know neither the Scriptures nor the power of God?” (Mk 12:24).

The Scriptures invite us to believe: “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe” (Jn 20:29), but God, who is more deeply present to me than I am to myself (cf. Saint Augustine, Confessions, III, 6, 11) – has the power to come to us, particularly through our inner senses, so that the soul can receive the gentle touch of a reality which is beyond the senses and which enables us to reach what is not accessible or visible to the senses.

For this to happen, we must cultivate an interior watchfulness of the heart which, for most of the time, we do not possess on account of the powerful pressure exerted by outside realities and the images and concerns which fill our soul (cf. Theological Commentary on The Message of Fatima, 2000).

Yes! God can come to us, and show himself to the eyes of our heart.

Moreover, that Light deep within the shepherd children, which comes from the future of God, is the same Light which was manifested in the fullness of time and came for us all: the Son of God made man. He has the power to inflame the coldest and saddest of hearts, as we see in the case of the disciples on the way to Emmaus (cf. Lk 24:32).

Henceforth our hope has a real foundation, it is based on an event which belongs to history and at the same time transcends history: Jesus of Nazareth.

The enthusiasm roused by his wisdom and his saving power among the people of that time was such that a woman in the midst of the crowd – as we heard in the Gospel – cried out: “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts that nursed you!”.

And Jesus said: “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it!” (Lk 11:27-28).

But who finds time to hear God’s word and to let themselves be attracted by his love? Who keeps watch, in the night of doubt and uncertainty, with a heart vigilant in prayer? Who awaits the dawn of the new day, fanning the flame of faith?

Faith in God opens before us the horizon of a sure hope, one which does not disappoint; it indicates a solid foundation on which to base one’s life without fear; it demands a faith-filled surrender into the hands of the Love which sustains the world.

“Their descendants shall be known among the nations, […] they are a people whom the Lord has blessed” (Is 61:9) with an unshakable hope which bears fruit in a love which sacrifices for others, yet does not sacrifice others.

Rather, as we heard in the second reading, this love “bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (1 Cor 13:7).

An example and encouragement is to be found in the shepherd children, who offered their whole lives to God and shared them fully with others for love of God.

Our Lady helped them to open their hearts to universal love. Blessed Jacinta, in particular, proved tireless in sharing with the needy and in making sacrifices for the conversion of sinners. Only with this fraternal and generous love will we succeed in building the civilization of love and peace.

We would be mistaken to think that Fatima’s prophetic mission is complete. Here, there takes on new life the plan of God which asks humanity from the beginning: “Where is your brother Abel […] Your brother’s blood is crying out to me from the ground!” (Gen 4:9).

Mankind has succeeded in unleashing a cycle of death and terror, but failed in bringing it to an end… In sacred Scripture we often find that God seeks righteous men and women in order to save the city of man and he does the same here, in Fatima, when Our Lady asks: “Do you want to offer yourselves to God, to endure all the sufferings which he will send you, in an act of reparation for the sins by which he is offended and of supplication for the conversion of sinners?” (Memoirs of Sister Lúcia, I, 162).

At a time when the human family was ready to sacrifice all that was most sacred on the altar of the petty and selfish interests of nations, races, ideologies, groups and individuals, our Blessed Mother came from heaven, offering to implant in the hearts of all those who trust in her the Love of God burning in her own heart.

At that time it was only to three children, yet the example of their lives spread and multiplied, especially as a result of the travels of the Pilgrim Virgin, in countless groups throughout the world dedicated to the cause of fraternal solidarity.

May the seven years which separate us from the centenary of the apparitions hasten the fulfilment of the prophecy of the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, to the glory of the Most Holy Trinity.

---

AFP's pre-Mass story had many interesting details:

Pope Benedict XVI draws huge crowds
for Mass at Fatima



FATIMA, May 13 (AFP) - Pilgrims flooded the shrine of Fatima on Thursday, many after spending the night outdoors, to attend a mass celebrated by Pope Benedict XVI at one of Christianity's most holy shrines.

The faithful climbed on statues of saints to get a better view and parents carried young children on their backs as police and boy scouts in their brown uniforms controled the flow of people into the esplanade of the shrine.

A choir sang "Welcome to Portugal Holy Father" as the 83-year-old head of the Roman Catholic Church entered the sprawling square in his bullet-proof white Popemobile as people applauded and waved white handkerchiefs.

Up to 500,000 people were expected to attend the Mass on the esplanade at Fatima, where three children claimed to have seen the Virgin Mary in 1917, turning the Portuguese village into one of the biggest draws for the Roman Catholic faithful.

Benedict's Mass on Thursday is the high point of a four-day visit to Portugal and rain fell on thousands who spent the night on the esplanade in sleeping bags -- and a lucky few under tents -- to make sure they got a place.

"The rain was harder to deal with than the cold. We came to the altar at 4:30 am but there were already lots of people here, we are not as close to it as we would like," said Isaac Gonzales, 24, from Seville in Spain.

Despite the child sex scandal that has rocked the Church, the 83-year-old pope remains a huge draw. Hours before his arrival, pilgrims had claimed spots on every spare statue in the main square.

Bedraggled pilgrims formed huge queues outside the portable toilets and Fatima's cafes hoping to get breakfast.

Before the Pope's arrival a large group of Spanish youths gathered near the altar where Benedict was to celebrate the Mass, singing hymns, beating tambourines and dancing as they waited for the ceremony.

"We have come to support the Pope so that, wherever he goes, he feels the presence of young people," said Juan Moreno, a 20-year-old software engineering student who was part of a group of 87 students who spent the night in the bus that brought them to Fatima from Madrid.

Others sat quietly in folding chairs, reciting the rosary prayer. Behind them fluttered the flags of national groups from Italy, Ireland, Brazil, Germany, the Netherlands and many from Spain.

The Pope led a huge candle-lit ceremony on the esplanade on Wednesday night. Chants of "Vivo o Papa" rose up from the crowd before being drowned out by massed choirs singing hymns.

The paedophile priest controversy has failed to dampen enthusiasm and Benedict has drawn vast crowds throughout his trip to Portugal. The trip began on Tuesday with an outdoor mass in Lisbon's biggest square, which police later said 280,000 people had attended, exceeding expectations. [And this does not even mention the crowds along the routes of the Popemobile in Lisbon! Trip organizers verey wisely provided for the Popemobile to travel trhough as many different routes - that were well publicized - through Lisbon.]

Shortly after his arrival here from Lisbon, the Pope told priests to "take a firm stand" for their vocation. [No, it was much better! He asked priests to look after each other so that they can help those who may strat fron their vocation 'to stay firm on their feet'.]

He also used the visit to warn Portugal of the consequences of increasing secularism in the country, where nearly 90 percent are Catholic but only about 20 percent are practising.


BTW, I've checked the New York Times and find out - to some mild shock notwithstanding its record - that they have not reported on the Pope's visit since their May 11 story about the Pope's statement about the 'sins of the Church'. Not even the Mass in Lisbon - which drew an attendance of 280,000 by updated police estimates - merited a line.... I'll be checking their site periodically to see if they will even acknowledge the Fatima Mass....That's America's 'newspaper of record' which boasts it has 'all teh news that's fit to print'!

Meanwhile, here's the AP report:


A Mass in Fatima, Pope Benedict XVI
offers hope against suffering
by BARRY HATTON



FATIMA, Portugal, May 13 (AP) – Pope Benedict XVI on Thursday offered comfort to those enduring hardship, telling some 400,000 pilgrims at the Fatima shrine that suffering is not in vain.

The outdoor Mass was the centerpiece of Benedict's four-day visit to Portugal and marked the anniversary of the day 93 years ago when three local shepherd children reported having visions of the Virgin in this small farming town.

The May 13 celebrations are one of the Catholic church's major annual pilgrimages to a site where, many believe, the Virgin still works miracles.

"I have come to Fatima to pray, in union with Mary and so many pilgrims, for our human family, afflicted as it is by various ills and sufferings," Benedict told the crowd.

Urging the infirm to take heart, he told them they can "overcome the feeling of uselessness, of suffering which wears people down and makes them feel like they are a weight around the neck of others, when in fact suffering, lived through Jesus, leads to salvation."

His message struck a chord with many in the huge crowd.

Aurora Clemente, a 65-year-old cook from Portugal's northeastern tip, close to the border with Spain, said she had been coming to Fatima on May 13 for more than 30 years.

"Fatima makes miracles. When my son was seriously ill, I prayed to the Virgin of Fatima and he survived," she said.

"I find it very moving here. For me, this is the most beautiful place in the world, she said, sitting beneath a red umbrella on the fringe of the crowd.

Many travel to Fatima seeking cures for ailments. One of the rituals pilgrims perform there involves casting replicas of body parts — eyes, lungs, hearts — on sale at local shops into a big bonfire while reciting a prayer asking for healing.

The Pope blessed more than 400 infirm people after the Mass.

Benedict was the third Pontiff to visit Fatima, beginning with Paul VI in 1967. John Paul II — who was shot in St. Peter's Square on May 13, 1981 — came three times before his death, believing that the Virgin's "unseen hand" had "rescued him from death," Benedict said Wednesday.

The bullet that almost killed John Paul forms part of the crown of Fatima's statue of the Virgin. The statue, decked with white and yellow roses, was carried shoulder-high through the crowd by soldiers before the Mass.

Benedict has spoken repeatedly about the sufferings of the world and even the Church's troubles during the trip, saying the "sins of the Church" were responsible for the clerical sex abuse scandal. [NO! Is that a stupid re-statement or what? The clerical sex abuses are part of the sins within the Church!]

Since arriving in Lisbon on Tuesday, he has scolded society for failing to care for the needy. [Benedict XVI never 'scolds'!] He has said the global economic crisis demonstrated the need for greater moral responsibility in running the global financial system.

A mass of people filled the shrine's bowl-like square sloping down from the Holy Trinity church, which can hold close to 9,000 people, to the tiny Chapel of the Apparitions and, behind it, a 70-meter-high basilica with a golden crown and a cross on its bell tower.

Many arrived with a fold-up stool in one hand and an umbrella in the other due to occasional downpours, but as the Mass began the sun emerged from behind dark clouds and stayed throughout the ceremony.

Filipa Bonvalot, a 47-year-old company director from Lisbon who was in the crowd with her husband and her two teenage daughters, said: "This place offers comfort. A lot of people have found consolation here."

Her youngest daughter Marta said she remembers first coming to see John Paul II in 2000, when she was six.

"I feel different when I leave here. I feel better," she said.

Benedict also was due to meet with church social workers and Portuguese bishops.

He returns to the Vatican on Friday after celebrating a Mass in Porto, the country's second-largest city.


Pope Benedict in Fatima:
a pilgrim full of love
for Christ and his Church



(13 May 10 – RV) In seven years, it will be a century since three little children by the names of Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta experienced a series of Apparitions of Our Lady in a little hollow by the name of Cova de Iria, starting on May 13, 1917.

On Thursday, Pope Benedict XVI said to about half a million faithful gathered uin Fatima, “you will return here on this date, celebrating that visit from a Lady come down from heaven”, in his homily at the Mass he offered to mark this special Feast day which this year coincides with the Feast of the Ascension.

Behind him the creamy white Basilica with its long neoclassical colonnade stood out against the cloudy skies dominating the huge sloping esplanade. The three seers of Fatima are now buried there.

Already, Wednesday night, the pilgrims turned the square into an ocean of flickering lights for the traditional candelelight procession on the eve of the feast.

On Thursday it was a sea, bobbing up and down with tiny white waves - handkerchiefs waved by the Portuguese as a devotional practice, to greet Our Lady, as the statue representing her was carried around the square. The tradition lives on in this nation of historical seafarers who were used to wave farewell to their loved ones as they set out to sea.

In his homily the Holy Father said “I too come here as a pilgrim, to this home from which Mary chose to speak to us in modern times”.

Pope Benedict said he to rejoiced in Mary’s presence and maternal protection and that he prayed to her for our human family afflicted as it is by various ills and sufferings.

“I have come with the same sentiments as those of Blessed Francisco and Jacinta, and the Servant of God Sister Lucia, in order to entrust to Our Lady the intimate confession that I love Jesus, that the Church and priests love him”.

The Pope said he prayed in a special way for the afflicted or outcast “with the desire of bringing them that great hope which burns in my own heart and which here in Fatima can be palpably felt”.

Finally, referring to the so-called secrets of Fatima, the third of which was revealed ten years ago in this very same place in the presence of John Paul II and the last surviving Sr. Lucia, the Pope said it is wrong to think that Fatima’s prophetic mission is complete.

It was he, as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, who wrote the Theological Commentary that accompanied the disclosure of the 'third secret'.

He expressed the hope that the seven years which separate us from the centenary of the Apparitions may hasten the fulfillment of the prophecy of the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

When Mass was over, the Successor of Peter went into into the Basilica to pray before the tombs of those three little shepherd children who received the first of many visits from Our Lady 93 years ago today.



Pope lauds 'maternity of God'
as counter-sign to egoism
By JOHN L. ALLEN JR.

Fatima, Portugal
May 13, 2010


In the teeth of a world inclined to sacrifice unity “on the altar of base egoisms of nation, race, ideology, the group and the individual,” Pope Benedict XVI today proposed Fatima as a counter-sign of the “wondrous maternity of God.”

The comments came in the Pontiff’s homily this morning for an open-air Mass in the world’s premier Marian shrine, before a vast and tightly-packed crowd estimated at half a million. Today is the feast of Our Lady of Fatima, recalling the reported apparitions of Mary to three shepherd children in this spot between May and October 1917.

Benedict’s use of feminine imagery was striking, though in context the phrase “maternity of God” appeared to refer to Mary’s role as the Mother of God. Benedict said that Mary testifies to the “sweet joys” of God’s love for humanity.

The Pope lauded the three young visionaries of Fatima, saying they had “an experience of grace.” At the same time, the Pontiff insisted that Christian faith does not depend upon such dramatic confirmation.

God, the Pope said, “has the power to reach us through the interior senses, so that the soul receives the gentle touch of a reality that lies beyond sensible things.”

To perceive that invisible presence of God, Benedict said, requires “an internal vigilance of the heart.” That disposition to seek God’s “gentle touch,” the Pope said, is precisely what’s often missing in the modern world.

“Who has the time to listen to God’s word and to be carried away his love?” the pope asked. “Who stays vigilant, in the night of doubt and uncertainty, with a heart extended in prayer? Who awaits the dawn of a new day, keeping the flame of the faith alive?”

The perennial need to rekindle those qualities, the Pope said, means that the “prophetic mission” of Fatima is never extinguished.

Noting that the Fatima devotion began with just three young missionaries, the Pope said that by now “their example of life has spread and multiplied in countless groups over the entire surface of the earth.”

Benedict also noted that in 2017, seven years from now, Fatima will celebrate the 100th anniversary of the 1917 visions. Those experiences unfolded against the backdrop of the upheaval and persecutions unleashed by the overthrow of the monarchy in Portugal in 1910 and the birth of a secular republic.

In the decades since, Fatima has become one of the most popular Marian shrines in the world. It’s also associated with a series of revelations from Mary reported by the seers of Fatima, which included a vision of Hell, of future wars, and of a bishop in white attacked by bullets and arrows – that last vision popularly interpreted as a reference to the 1981 assassination attempt against Pope John Paul II, which took place on the feast of Our Lady of Fatima in May 1981.

Benedict invoked one element of the Fatima visions at the conclusion of his homily this morning, praying that the seven years between now and the 100th anniversary of the apparitions in 2017 will hasten “the pre-announced triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary to the glory of the Most Holy Trinity.”

The young seers of Fatima reported that Mary had told them to promote devotion to her Immaculate Heart throughout the world, and that in the end the Immaculate Heart would triumph and usher in an age of peace.

The legacy of Fatima has had powerful echoes in American Catholicism. A Catholic association in the United States, the Association for the Arch of Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, today announced plans to raise between $85 and $100 million to build a 700-foot monument in Buffalo, New York, dedicated to the Immaculate Heart. Plans call for the structure to be 700 feet tall, which organizers say would make it the tallest monument in the world.

Beyond the reference to Fatima, organizers also intend the monument as a "pro-life shrine," meaning a rallying point for opposition to abortion and the defense of human life from conception to natural death.

So far, the Pope has drawn large and enthusiastic crowds in Fatima. Hundreds of thousands gathered yesterday to watch the Pope pray before the statue of the Madonna of Fatima and to recite the rosary in the square facing the large basilica here. The crowd also took part in a torchlight vigil last night, repeatedly crying “Viva o Papa” and cheering the Pope’s presence.

The Mass this morning drew a throng despite chilly and rainy weather in the early morning hours in Fatima, though by the time the Pope arrived at mid-morning the sun was shining.

As part of the entrance procession, the small statue of Our Lady of Fatima with the bullet doctors removed from John Paul II set in its crown was carried on a bed of flowers to be set on the altar where the Pope celebrated Mass. During the procession, the crowd repeatedly sang “Ave Maria.”

The 83-year-old Pontiff has seemed in good form thus far into the trip, despite being slightly hoarse at one point yesterday. Later this afternoon, Benedict will visit a social center operated by the Catholic church and then speak at a meeting of Portugal’s bishops.

So far Benedict's trip has drawn largely positive coverage in the local press, which has focused in particular on the large crowds which have greeted the Pontiff.

Particularly in the context of the sexual abuse crisis which has swirled around the Vatican and the papacy in recent weeks, the enthusiastic reception has been striking.

[But perhaps the only people surprised at the enthusiastic reception that Benedict XVI consistently gets everywhere are the MSM and like-minded people who under-estimate the depth of faith among Catholics and think that the negative image of the Church and the Pope generated by the media will suffice to shake that faith. It is not news that there are priests and bishops who are sinful when they should set the exanple. But Catholics know everyone is sinful, and that is why Christ came to redeem man, and why the Christian life is a daily striving to overcome sin and to purify oneself in prayer, penitence and good deeds.

The reception by the Portuguese shouldn't be surprising at all in a nation whose entire history and culture are deeply impregnated with Catholicism. As in Malta, secularization cannot and does not extirpate those historical and culture roots easily.

Catholic roots go deep even in predominantly secular nations - look at the reception the Pope got in the Czech Republic, considered the post-Communist poster icon for de-Christianization! Or in France, where secularism has long been tied to rabid anti-clericalism. Or Brazil, the largest Catholic nation on earth, there the faith flourishes in folk religion and anti-abortion advocates surprisingly continue to outnumber their opponents. Or in the United States, where there is a core of staunchly orthodox Catholics who do not subscribe to the cafeteria Catholicism of their liberal brethren.]

Aside from the large Portuguese turnout, there’s also a considerable international presence in Fatima this week. Pilgrims from various nations formed part of the opening procession for the papal Mass.

Cardinals Antonio Rouco Varela of Madrid and Lluís Martínez Sistach of Barcelona are in Fatima, as is Cardinal Joseph Zen, the emeritus bishop of Hong Kong.

Also on hand is Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston, who spent time in Portugal as a young Capuchin friar and who has long been engaged in pastoral outreach to Portuguese-speaking Catholics in the United States and elsewhere.

Since it's Thursday, Bruno Mastroianni is back with his weekly blog. Occasionally, he throws out some arguments that are incomplete or need to be better qualified, or may be downright disputable. This is one of those.


Waking up from torpor
Translated from

May 13, 2010


It is right to think that the Church could improve its communications. But it would be an error to think that at the root of the summary and unjust criticisms of the Pope is simply lack of journalistic professionalism. Nor does the problem lie in the media per se. Many of them, in recent days, have provided prompt and correct information.

[I don't think any thinking Catholic assumes that the root problem is the media. Only that the media and their reporting on the Church and the Pope are the most obvious manifestations of a secular culture that openly opposes the most basic teachings of the Catholic Church.]

What's happening is more profound: It is the manifestation of a friction between current thinking and the logic of the Gospel, which already predicted, "Blessed are you when they insult you and persecute you and utter every kind of evil falsely against you because of me". (Mt 5,11). [More than friction, it is open contradiction/opposition, but then, the Gospel also tells us that Jesus is 'destined to be a sign that will be contradicted"].

What's interesting is that, from the perspective of the media spotlight, though this friction seems to be exclusively a threat to the good image of the Church, it actually has some good results.

Just think that these days, leaving aside the polemical debates, people are also talking about the importance of holiness in priests, the relationship between the Pope and his bishops, the concept itself of sin and redemption.

Just think of the opportunity to reflect on the nature of the Church: a holy institution that was divinely founded, but made up of imperfect men, and because of this, she must courageously [and incessantly!] heal her own wounds.

When else would these topics come up if the media were left to their usual fare of economic-political concerns that occupy them most of the time?*

In fact, the media scuffles that have marked the pontificate of Benedict XVI so far have always highlighted significant issues, and are not just as consequences of a communication gap. Media simply register the fits and starts of a world that is shaken from its usual torpor. [Only if the media were reliably objective and not systematically engaged in pushing a secular agenda that strikes at the heart of everything that it means to be a Christian!]


*Provided the issues are discussed enough. But there is a tendency to drop a topic when the media has lost interest in it.

Consider the Pope's Letter to the Irish Catholics! It is dense with doctrinal, spiritual, ecclesiastical and sociological insights, not to mention its concrete exhortations to all sectors of society with their respective stakes in the sex-abuse issue, and its prescriptions for penance that must be done - not simply in terms of justice for the victims - but in spiritual ways.

All of that appear to have been forgotten in the snap of a finger. It wasn't even a nine-day wonder in the media. No, this did not fit into their stereotype of Benedict XVI, and before the world could take proper notice of it, "Quick, let's find something that will make him look so bad no one will even remember he wrote the Letter to the Irish!"

They certainly succeeded in their diversionary tactics using Fathers Hullermann, Murphy and Kiesle as red herrings, even if the 'cases' they purported to make against Joseph Ratzinger quickly deflated for lack of substance.

They succeeded so well that they have even forgotten Benedict covered all the bases about sinful priests and bishops and the damage they have done to the Church in that epochal letter - so they have greeted every statement he subsequently made as something 'new' that the Pope has come to 'admit' because of 'media pressure'.

And is anyone talking at all about everything the Pope wrote in the Letter to the Irish? I hope the Irish Catholics and their bishops are, at least!

Day 2 in Fatima:
CELEBRATION OF THE WORD WITH
ORGANIZATIONS FOR SOCIAL PASTORAL CARE
THE HOLY FATHER'S HOMILY
Church of the Most Holy Trinity - Fátima
Thursday, 13 May 2010



The new Basilica of the Most Holy Trinity in Fatima, consecrated in 2007, seats 8600. It is located at the other end of the esplanade from the old Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary. The Chapel of teh Apparitions is at lower right side of the photo. The inset shows the main entrance to the new Basilica.

---

Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Dear Friends,

You have heard Jesus say: “Go and do likewise” (Lk 10:37). He exhorts us to imitate the example of the Good Samaritan, which was just now proclaimed, when approaching situations which call for fraternal assistance.

And what is this example? It is that of “a heart which sees”. “This heart sees where love is needed and acts accordingly” (Deus Caritas Est, 31).

This is how the Good Samaritan acted. Jesus does not only exhort us; as the Fathers of the Church taught, he is himself the Good Shepherd who draws near to each man and “pours upon his wounds the oil of consolation and the wine of hope” (Portuguese Common Preface VIII).

Christ then leads him to the inn, which is the Church, entrusts him to the care of his ministers and pays in person, beforehand, for his healing.

“Go and do likewise”. The unconditional love of Jesus which has healed us must now become a love bestowed freely and generously, through justice and charity, if we want to live with a good Samaritan’s heart.

I am very happy to meet you in this holy place where God chose to remind mankind, through Mary, of his plan of merciful love. I offer a friendly greeting to all of you, and to the institutions which you represent.

Yours is a variety of faces, all one in concern for social issues and, above all, in showing compassion to the poor, the infirm, prisoners, the lonely and abandoned, the disabled, children and the elderly, migrants, the unemployed and all those who experience needs which compromise personal dignity and freedom.

I thank Bishop Carlos Azevedo, for the pledge of communion and fidelity to the Church and to the Pope which he has expressed both on the part of this assembly of charity and of the Episcopal Commission for Pastoral Social Work of which he is President, which constantly encourages this great sowing of charitable works throughout Portugal.

Conscious, as the Church, of not being able to provide practical solutions to each concrete problem, and lacking any kind of power, yet determined to serve the common good, you are ready to assist and to offer the means of salvation to all.

Dear brothers and sisters working in the vast world of charity, “Christ reveals to us that ‘God is love’ (1 Jn 4:8) and at the same time teaches that the fundamental law of human perfection, and consequently of the transformation of the world, is the new commandment of love. He assures those who trust in the charity of God that the way of love is open to all” (Gaudium et Spes, 38).

History presently offers us a scenario of socio-economic, cultural and spiritual crisis, which highlights the need for a discernment guided by a creative proposal of the Church’s social message.

The study of her social doctrine, which takes charity as its principal strength and guide, will make possible a process of integral human development capable of engaging the depths of the human heart and achieving a greater humanization of society (cf. Caritas in Veritate, 20).

This is not simply a matter of intellectual knowledge, but of a wisdom which can provide creativity, a sort of flavour and seasoning, to the intellectual and practical approaches aimed at meeting this broad and complex crisis.

May the Church’s institutions, together with all non-ecclesial organizations, perfect their theoretical analyses and their concrete directives in view of a new and grandiose process capable of leading to “that civilization of love, whose seed God has planted in every people, in every culture” (ibid., 33).

In its social and political dimension, this service of charity is the proper realm of the lay faithful, who are called to promote organically justice and the common good, and to configure social life correctly (cf. Deus Caritas Est, 29).

One pastoral conclusion which emerged in your recent reflections is that a new generation of servant leaders needs to be trained. Attracting new lay workers for this pastoral field surely calls for particular concern on the part of the Church’s pastors as they look to the future.

Anyone who learns from the God who is Love will inevitably be a person for others. In effect, “the love of God is revealed in responsibility for others” (Spe Salvi, 28).

United to Christ in his consecration to the Father, we are seized by his compassion for the multitudes who cry out for justice and solidarity, and like the Good Samaritan in the parable, committed to providing concrete and generous responses.

Often, however, it is not easy to arrive at a satisfactory synthesis between spiritual life and apostolic activity. The pressure exerted by the prevailing culture, which constantly holds up a lifestyle based on the law of the stronger, on easy and attractive gain, ends up influencing our ways of thinking, our projects and the goals of our service, and risks emptying them of the motivation of faith and Christian hope which had originally inspired them.

The many pressing requests which we receive for support and assistance from the poor and marginalized of society impel us to look for solutions which correspond to the logic of efficiency, quantifiable effects and publicity.

Nonetheless, the synthesis which I mentioned above is absolutely necessary, dear brothers and sisters, if you are to serve Christ in the men and women who look to you. In this world of division, all of us are called to have a profound and authentic unity of heart, spirit and action.

The many social institutions which serve the common good, and are close to those in need, include those of the Catholic Church. The guiding principles of the latter need to be clear, so that they can be clearly indentifiable by the inspiration of their aims, in the choice of their human resources, in their methods of operation, in the quality of their services, and in the serious and effective management of their means.

The solid identity of these institutions provides a real service, and is of great help to those who benefit from them. Beyond this issue of identity, and connected with it, it is a fundamental step to ensure that Christian charitable activity is granted autonomy and independence from politics and ideologies (cf. Deus Caritas Est, 31b), even while cooperating with state agencies in the pursuit of common goals.

The services you provide, and your educational and charitable activities, must all be crowned by projects of freedom whose goal is human promotion and universal fraternity.

Here we can locate the urgent commitment of Christians in defence of human rights, with concern for the totality of the human person in its various dimensions.

I express my deep appreciation for all those social and pastoral initiatives aimed at combating the socio-economic and cultural mechanisms which lead to abortion, and are openly concerned to defend life and to promote the reconciliation and healing of those harmed by the tragedy of abortion.

Initiatives aimed at protecting the essential and primary values of life, beginning at conception, and of the family based on the indissoluble marriage between a man and a woman, help to respond to some of today’s most insidious and dangerous threats to the common good.

Such initiatives represent, alongside numerous other forms of commitment, essential elements in the building of the civilization of love.

All this fits very closely with the message of Our Lady which resounds in this place: penance, prayer and forgiveness aimed at the conversion of hearts. In this way you are building the civilization of love, whose seeds God has sown in the heart of every man and woman, to which faith in Christ the Saviour gives abundant growth.

---

On the basis of the above homily, the report below is the template for what the news agencies have reported. Not just Reuters but all the other news agencies led off with the line 'Pope says gay marriage is insidious and dangerous' - when the Pope never once mentioned 'gay marriage', much less what the Reuters headline claims he did!


Pope urges Portuguese
to oppose gay marriage law
By Philip Pullella and Vitor Moreira


FATIMA, Portugal, May 13 (Reuters) – Pope Benedict on Wednesday condemned gay marriage as an "insidious" threat to society, implicitly encouraging Portuguese to work against a proposed law that would legalize it.

The Pope, wrapping up his trip to this country where more than 90 percent of the population is officially Catholic, made his appeal in the shrine city of Fatima on a day that started with a Mass attended by up to half a million people.

In his afternoon address to Catholic charity and social workers, the 83-year-old German Pope said he "deeply appreciated" initiatives aimed at defending what he said were "essential and primary values of life."

Among these values, he said, was "the family, founded on indissoluble marriage between a man and a woman," which is Vatican-speak for its opposition to gay marriage.

The audience applauded when the Pope said abortion -- which has been legal in Portugal since 2007 -- and threats to heterosexual marriage were "among some of the most insidious and dangerous challenges facing the common good today."

Portugal's Parliament last January passed a bill by the minority Socialist government of Prime Minister Jose Socrates that would legalize same-sex marriages. The government rejected alternative proposals by the center-right opposition for civil partnerships and a referendum on gay marriage.

President Anibal Cavaco Silva is under great pressure from the Church and conservative groups not to ratify the bill. If he vetoes it, Parliament can override the veto with another vote.

On Thursday morning a crowd of up to half a million people turned out to greet the Pope at one of holiest shrines in the 1.2 billion-member Catholic Church.

Pilgrims carrying banners and national flags braved a dawn drizzle in the town where the Church believes the Madonna appeared to three poor shepherd children in 1917 and gave them three messages in the form of visions.

The first two were revealed soon and concerned a vision of hell, the prediction of the outbreak of World War Two, a warning that Russia would "spread her errors" in the world, and the need for general conversion to God and the need for prayer.

The "third secret" intrigued the world for half a century before it was revealed, inspiring books, cults convinced that it predicted the end of the world, and even a hijacking.

In 2000, the Vatican said the secret was a prediction of the 1981 assassination attempt on Pope John Paul on May 13, the same day of the first reported apparition in 1917.

Fatima gets some 5 million visitors a year and the pilgrim trade is the engine of the area's economy.

On Friday, Benedict makes a morning visit to Portugal's second city, Oporto, before returning to Rome.

EWTN News (Partnering with CNA) ran with the story too, which of course pretty much defeats the whole purpose of having a dedicated Catholic news agency

www.ewtnnews.com/new.php?id=660




Both CNA and EWTN are usually quite orthodox! I am surprised the desk editor allowed the article as is. The CNS story is no better. John Thavis starts it this way:

---

FATIMA, Portugal (CNS) -- On his third day in Portugal, Pope Benedict XVI took aim at two issues that have deeply disturbed Church leaders in the predominantly Catholic country: abortion and gay marriage.

The Pope said abortion and efforts to promote same-sex marriage were "insidious and dangerous threats to the common good," and he encouraged pastoral workers in Portugal to keep up their efforts to protect the unborn and the traditional family.

---

First of all, suppose the Pope did refer outright to 'marriage between homosexuals' (which he has never ever done, preferring to speak about it in terms of defending matrimony and the traditional family, as he did today), what is new about him speaking out against abortion and anything that threatens the traditional family? Why do they make it 'news' everytime he reiterates Catholic teaching that they disagree with?

If the Pope had never mentioned abortion, defense of life and the family, the MSM would probably never have even reported the event at all! But he did, and they immediately saw the chance to 'neutralize', as it were, the impact of the Mass today, so that tomorrow's headlines would be 'Pope attacks gay marriage' rather than 'Half a million attend Papal Mass'.


TERESA

Hardly mentioned in any of the reports about the Mass in Fatima was that afterwards, the Holy Father went into the Basilica of the Most Holy Rosary
to pray at the graves of the three visionaries - a grave oversight, since after all, the occasion for the Pope's visit to Fatima was to commemorate
the tenth anniversary of the beatification of Francisco and Jacinta.


Day 2 in Fatima:
VISIT TO THE GRAVES
OF FRANCISCO, JACINTA & LUCIA










Below, the Basilica of Our Lady with the pictures of Francisco and Jacinta on the day John Paul II beatified them in 2000, and
an icon of the two child Blesseds:


The children around the time of the apparitions in 1917:

Francisco died in 1919, two months before his 11th birthday, and Jacinta died the next year, less than a month before she would turn 10.
Both were victims of the great influenza pandemic after the Second World War.

The Servant of God Sister Lucia of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary (1907-2005):


Sor Lucia came to Fatima for Pope Paul VI's visit in 1967, and then met with John Paul II during his three visits there, on special dispensation
from her convent in Coimbra, where she lived as a Carmelite nun. Above right, she prays at the tomb of Francisco on her last visit there in 2000.

Last February, on the fifth anniversary of her death, Benedict XVI paved the canonical way for her beatification.

None of the news agencies reported on this event either, at which the Pope did not say any of the buzz words that appears to interest MSM exclusively. And yet, as always, his addresses to priests and bishops are always particularly striking because he speaks from his personal day-to-day experience.


Day 2 IN FATIMA:
MEETING WITH THE BISHOPS OF PORTUGAL



The Casa de Nostra Senhora del Carmo, a retreat house in the shrime complex, where the Holy Father stayed while in Fatima, and where the meeting with the bishops was held.





Here is the Vatican translation of the Holy Father's address to the bishops:

---

Dear Brother Bishops,

I thank God for giving me this occasion to meet all of you here at the Shrine of Fatima, the spiritual heart of Portugal, where multitudes of pilgrims from all over the world come looking to discover or to reinforce their certainty in the truths of Heaven.

Among them has come from Rome the Successor of Peter, accepting the oft-repeated invitations and moved by a debt of gratitude to the Virgin Mary, who herself transmitted to her seers and pilgrims an intense love for the Holy Father which has borne fruit in a great multitude which prays, with Jesus as its guide: Peter, “I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren” (Lk 22:32).

As you see, the Pope needs to open himself ever more fully to the mystery of the Cross, embracing it as the one hope and the supreme way to gain and to gather in the Crucified One all his brothers and sisters in humanity.

Obeying the word of God, he is called to live not for himself but for the presence of God in the world. I am comforted by the determination with which you too follow me closely, fearing nothing except the loss of eternal salvation for your people, as was clearly expressed in the words of greeting spoken by Archbishop Jorge Ortiga upon my arrival in your midst, and which testify to the unconditional fidelity of the Bishops of Portugal to the Successor of Peter. From my heart I thank you.

I thank you as well for all the attention that you have given to organizing my Visit. May God reward you, and pour out the Holy Spirit in abundance upon you and your Dioceses so that, with one heart and with one soul, you may bring to completion the pastoral work which you have begun, that is, offering each member of the faithful an exacting and attractive Christian initiation, one which communicates the integrity of the faith and genuine spirituality, rooted in the Gospel, and capable of forming free and generous labourers in the midst of public life.

In truth, the times in which we live demand a new missionary vigour on the part of Christians, who are called to form a mature laity, identified with the Church and sensitive to the complex transformations taking place in our world.

Authentic witnesses to Jesus Christ are needed, above all in those human situations where the silence of the faith is most widely and deeply felt: among politicians, intellectuals, communications professionals who profess and who promote a monocultural ideal, with disdain for the religious and contemplative dimension of life.

In such circles are found some believers who are ashamed of their beliefs and who even give a helping hand to this type of secularism, which builds barriers before Christian inspiration.

And yet, dear brothers, may all those who defend the faith in these situations, with courage, with a vigorous Catholic outlook and in fidelity to the Magisterium, continue to receive your help and your insightful encouragement in order to live out, as faithful lay men
and women, their Christian freedom.

You maintain a strong prophetic dimension, without allowing yourselves to be silenced, in the present social context, for “the word of God is not fettered” (2 Tim 2:9). People cry out for the Good News of Jesus Christ, which gives meaning to their lives and protects their dignity.

In your role as first evangelizers, it will be useful for you to know and to understand the diverse social and cultural factors, to evaluate their spiritual deficiencies and to utilize effectively your pastoral resources.

What is decisive, however, is the ability to inculcate in all those engaged in the work of evangelization a true desire for holiness, in the awareness that the results derive above all from our union with Christ and the working of the Holy Spirit.

In fact, when, in the view of many people, the Catholic faith is no longer the common patrimony of society and, often, seen as a seed threatened and obscured by the “gods” and masters of this world, only with great difficulty can the faith touch the hearts of people by means simple speeches or moral appeals, and even less by a general appeal to Christian values.

The courageous and integral appeal to principles is essential and indispensable; yet simply proclaiming the message does not penetrate to the depths of people’s hearts, it does not touch their freedom, it does not change their lives.

What attracts is, above all, the encounter with believing persons who, through their faith, draw others to the grace of Christ by bearing witness to him.

The words of Pope John Paul II come to mind: “The Church needs above all great currents, movements and witnesses of holiness among the ‘Christifideles’ because it is from holiness that is born every authentic renewal of the Church, all intelligent enrichment of the faith and of the Christian life, the vital and fecund reactualization of Christianity with the needs of man, a renewed form of presence in the heart of human existence and of the culture of nations (Address for the XX Anniversary of the Promulgation of the Conciliar Decree “Apostolicam Actuositatem”, 18 November 1985).

One could say, “the Church has need of these great currents, movements and witnesses of holiness…, but there are none!”

In this regard, I confess to you the pleasant surprise that I had in making contact with the movements and the new ecclesial communities. Watching them, I had the joy and the grace to see how, at a moment of weariness in the Church, at a time when we were hearing about “the winter of the Church”, the Holy Spirit was creating a new springtime, awakening in young people and adults alike the joy of being Christian, of living in the Church, which is the living Body of Christ.

Thanks to their charisms, the radicality of the Gospel, the objective contents of the faith, the living flow of her tradition, are all being communicated in a persuasive way and welcomed as a personal experience, as adherence in freedom to the present event of Christ.

The necessary condition, naturally, is that these new realities desire to live in the one Church, albeit with spaces in some way set aside for their own life, in such a way that this life becomes fruitful for all the others.

The bearers of a particular charism must feel themselves fundamentally responsible for communion, for the common faith of the Church, and submit themselves to the leadership of their Bishops. It is they who must ensure the ecclesial nature of the movements.

Bishops are not only those who hold an office, but those who themselves are bearers of charisms, and responsible for the openness of the Church to the working of the Holy Spirit.

We, Bishops, in the sacrament of Holy Orders, are anointed by the Holy Spirit and thus the sacrament ensures that we too are open to his gifts. Thus, on the one hand, we must feel responsibility for welcoming these impulses which are gifts for the Church and which give her new vitality, but, on the other hand, we must also help the movements to find the right way, making some corrections with understanding – with the spiritual and human understanding that is able to combine guidance, gratitude and a certain openness and a willingness to learn.

This is precisely what you must foster or confirm in your priests. In this Year for Priests now drawing to a close, rediscover, dear brothers, the role of the Bishop as father, especially with regard to your priests.

For all too long the responsibility of authority as a service aimed at the growth of others and in the first place of priests, has been given second place.

Priests are called to serve, in their pastoral ministry, and to be part of a pastoral activity of communion or oneness, as the Conciliar Decree Presbyterorum Ordinis reminds us, “No priest is sufficiently equipped to carry out his mission alone and as it were single-handed. He can only do so by joining forces with other priests, under the leadership of those who govern the Church” (No. 7).

This is not a matter of turning back to the past, nor of a simple return to our origins, but rather of a recovery of the fervour of the origins, of the joy of the initial Christian experience, and of walking beside Christ like the disciples of Emmaus on the day of Easter, allowing his word to warm our hearts and his “broken bread” to open our eyes to the contemplation of his face.

Only in this way will the fire of charity blaze strongly enough to impel every Christian to become a source of light and life in the Church and among all men and women.

Before concluding, I would like to ask you, in your role as leaders and ministers of charity in the Church, to rekindle, in yourselves as individuals and as a group, a sense of mercy and of compassion, in order to respond to grave social needs.

New organizations must be established, and those already existing perfected, so that they can be capable of responding creatively to every form of poverty, including those experienced as a lack of the meaningfulness in life and the absence of hope.

The efforts you are making to assist the Dioceses most in need, especially in Portuguese-speaking countries, is praiseworthy. May difficulties, which today are more deeply felt, not make you shrink from the logic of self-giving.

Let there continue and flourish in this country, your witness as prophets of justice and peace, and defenders of the inalienable rights of the person.

Join your voice to the voices of the least powerful, whom you have wisely helped to gain a voice of their own, without ever being afraid of raising your voice on behalf of the oppressed, the downtrodden and those who have been mistreated.

I entrust all of you to Our Lady of Fatima, and I ask her to sustain you with her maternal care amid the challenges which you face, so that you will be promoters of a culture and a spirituality of charity, peace, hope and justice, faith and service.

To you, to the members of your families and to your diocesan communities I cordially impart my Apostolic Blessing.

---

May 14, 2010 Third Week in Easter

ST. MATTHIAS THE APOSTLE (d. 80 AD)
Little is known about the man whom the Apostles chose after the first Pentecost to replace Judas Iscariot.
"They nominated two men: Joseph Barsabbas and Matthias. They prayed and drew lots. The choice fell upon
Matthias, who was added to the Eleven". Even Benedict XVI, in his catechesis on the Apostles could not say
more than what the Acts of the Apostles reported, and mentioned Matthias only in his catechesis on Judas
Iscariot on Oct. 18, 2006. Matthias is thought to have preached beyond Judea, and some believe he was
martyred in what is now Georgia in the Caucasus. He was added to the Church's list of saints only in the
11th century.
Readings for today's Mass:
www.usccb.org/nab/readings/051411.shtml


OR today,

Illustration: The creation of Eve, Michelangelo, Sistine Chapel.
Benedict XVI to a meeting of the John Paul II Institute on Marriage and the Family:
'The true significance of the human body'
The other papal item in this issue is the full text of the Instruction Universae Ecclesiae on applying Summorum Pontificum which has been in force since Step. 14, 2007. Other Page 1 items: An editorial commentary denouncing a US congressional proposal that would legalize trading in human organs; a Taliban vengeance bombing in Pakistan for the killing of Usama Bin Laden kills at least 80 and injures hundreds of others in a Pakistani military base; and the US Federal Reserve chairman seeks ways to keep the US from defaulting on its debts if Congress Does not raise the country's debt limit.

AT THE VATICAN TODAY

The Holy Father met with

- Five bishops from India on ad-limina visit. Individual meetings.

- participants in he annual General Assembly of the Pontificie Opere Missionarie (Pontifical Missionary Works),
Address in Italian.


The Office of Pontifical Liturgies has announced the calendar of celebrations to be presided over by
the Holy Father from May to September this year.

END OF A VISIT:
Last stop: PORTO



The Pope flew on a Portuguese military helicopter from Fatima to Porto, where he was welcomed at Gaia airport by local officials and the Bishop of Porto, Mons. Manuel Clemente.

Before landing, the chopper flew over the city including the Avenida Aliados site of the Mass that the Pope celebrated later.




CELEBRATION OF THE EUCHARIST
Avenida Aliados, Porto




Here is the Vatican translation of the Holy Father's homily:

---

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

“It is written in the book of Psalms, … ‘His office let another take’. One of these men, then […] must become a witness with us to his resurrection” (Acts 1:20-22).

These were the words of Peter, as he read and interpreted the word of God in the midst of his brethren gathered in the Upper Room following Jesus’ ascension to heaven.

The one who was chosen was Matthias, who had been a witness to the public life of Jesus and his victory over death, and had remained faithful to him to the end, despite the fact that many abandoned him.

The “disproportion” between the forces on the field, which we find so alarming today, astounded those who saw and heard Christ two thousand years ago.

It was only he, from the shore of the Lake of Galilee right up to the squares of Jerusalem, alone or almost alone at the decisive moments: he, in union with the Father; he, in the power of the Spirit.

Yet it came about, in the end, that from the same love that created the world, the newness of the Kingdom sprang up like a small seed which rises from the ground, like a ray of light which breaks into the darkness, like the dawn of a unending day: it is Christ Risen. And he appeared to his friends, showing them the need for the Cross in order to attain the resurrection.

On that day Peter was looking for a witness to all this. Two were presented, and heaven chose “Matthias, and he was enrolled with the eleven apostles” (Acts 1:26).

Today we celebrate his glorious memory in this “undefeated city”, which festively welcomes the Successor of Peter. I give thanks to God that I have been able come here and meet you around the altar.

I offer a cordial greeting to you, my brethren and friends of the city and the Diocese of Porto, to those who have come from the ecclesiastical province of Northern Portugal and from nearby Spain, and to all those physically or spiritually present at this liturgical assembly.

I greet the Bishop of Oporto, Dom Manuel Clemente, who greatly desired this visit of mine, welcomed me with great affection, and voiced your sentiments at the beginning of this Eucharist.

I greet his predecessors, his brother Bishops, all the priests, women and men religious, and the lay faithful, and in particular those actively involved in the Diocesan Mission, and, more concretely, in the preparations for my visit.

I know that you have been able to count on the practical cooperation of the Mayor of Oporto and the public authorities, many of whom honour me by their presence; I wish to take advantage of this opportunity to greet them and to express to them, and to all whom they represent and serve, my best wishes for the good of all.

“One of these men must become with us a witness to his resurrection,” said Peter. His Successor now repeats to each of you: My brothers and sisters, you need to become witnesses with me to the resurrection of Jesus.

In effect, if you do not become his witnesses in your daily lives, who will do so in your place? Christians are, in the Church and with the Church, missionaries of Christ sent into the world.

This is the indispensable mission of every ecclesial community: to receive from God and to offer to the world the Risen Christ, so that every situation of weakness and of death may be transformed, through the Holy Spirit, into an opportunity for growth and life.

To this end, in every Eucharistic celebration, we will listen more attentively to the word of Christ and devoutly taste the bread of his presence. This will make us witnesses, and, even more, bearers of the Risen Jesus in the world, bringing him to the various sectors of society and to all those who live and work there, spreading that “life in abundance” (cf. Jn 10:10) which he has won for us by his cross and resurrection, and which satisfies the most authentic yearnings of the human heart.

We impose nothing, yet we propose ceaselessly, as Peter recommends in one of his Letters: “In your hearts, reverence Christ as Lord. Always be prepared to make a defence to any one who calls you to account for the hope that is in you” (1 Pet 3:15).

And everyone, in the end, asks this of us, even those who seem not to. From personal and communal experience, we know well that it is Jesus whom everyone awaits.

In fact, the most profound expectations of the world and the great certainties of the Gospel meet in the ineluctable mission which is ours, for “without God man neither knows which way to go, nor even understands who he is.

In the face of the enormous problems surrounding the development of peoples, which almost make us yield to discouragement, we find solace in the sayings of our Lord Jesus Christ, who teaches us: ‘Apart from me you can do nothing’ (Jn 15:5) and who encourages us: ‘I am with you always, to the close of the age’ (Mt 28:20)” (Caritas in Veritate, 78).

Yet even though this certainty consoles and calms us, it does not exempt us from going forth to others. We must overcome the temptation to restrict ourselves to what we already have, or think we have, safely in our possession: it would be sure death in terms of the Church’s presence in the world; the Church, for that matter, can only be missionary, in the outward movement of the Spirit.

From its origins, the Christian people has clearly recognized the importance of communicating the Good News of Jesus to those who did not yet know him.

In recent years the anthropological, cultural, social and religious framework of humanity has changed; today the Church is called to face new challenges and is ready to dialogue with different cultures and religions, in the search for ways of building, along with all people of good will, the peaceful coexistence of peoples.

The field of the mission ad gentes appears much broader today, and no longer to be defined on the basis of geographic considerations alone; in effect, not only non-Christian peoples and those who are far distant await us, but so do social and cultural milieux, and above all human hearts, which are the real goal of the missionary activity of the People of God.

This is the mandate whose faithful fulfilment “must follow the road Christ himself walked, a way of poverty and obedience, of service and of self-sacrifice even unto death, a death from which he emerged victorious by his resurrection” (Ad Gentes, 5).

Yes! We are called to serve the humanity of our own time, trusting in Jesus alone, letting ourselves be enlightened by his word: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide” (Jn 15:16).

How much time we have lost, how must work has been set back, on account of our lack of attention to this point! Everything is to be defined starting with Christ, as far as the origins and effectiveness of mission is concerned: we receive mission always from Christ, who has made known to us what he has heard from his Father, and we are appointed to mission through the Spirit, in the Church.

Like the Church herself, which is the work of Christ and his Spirit, it is a question of renewing the face of the earth starting from God, God always and alone.

Dear brothers and sisters of Porto, lift up your eyes to the One whom you have chosen as the patroness of your city, the Immaculate Conception.

The angel of the Annunciation greeted Mary as “full of grace”, signifying with this expression that her heart and her life were totally open to God and, as such, completely permeated by his grace. May Our Lady help you to make yourselves a free and total “Yes” to the grace of God, so that you can be renewed and thus renew humanity by the light and the joy of the Holy Spirit.

---

Thumbnails of the Porto pictures:


Right panel above includes photos of the Pope addressing the faithful from the balcony of the Municipal Palace (City Hall) after the Mass. The building was the back drop for the Mass.

Here is the Vatican translation of the words spoken by the Holy Father from the balcony of the Municipal Palace:

---

Brothers and sisters, my dear friends,

I am happy to be among you and I thank you for the festive and cordial welcome which I have received here in Oporto, the “City of the Virgin.”

To her motherly protection I entrust you and your families, your communities and institutions serving the common good, including the universities of the city whose students have gathered to show me their gratitude and their attachment to the teaching of the Successor of Peter.

Thank you for your presence and for the witness of your faith. I also thank again those who worked in various ways preparing and realizing my visit, especially the preparations made in prayer.

I would have happily prolonged my stay in your city, but it is not possible. So let me take my leave of you, embracing each one of you affectionately in Christ our Hope, as I give you my blessing in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

---

John Thavis of CNS filed a report from Porto that is unusual for the local color it describes - something most Vatican reporters generally omit.

Pope buoyed by enthusiastic
reception by the Portuguese
By John Thavis



PORTO, Portugal, May 14 (CNS) -- At his last stop in Portugal, Pope Benedict XVI received the kind of welcome that has buoyed his spirits throughout the four-day visit.

Residents of the northern city of Porto -- about 150,000 of them -- turned out to cheer, wave, sing and pray May 14 as the Pope arrived to celebrate Mass in a central city square.

The 83-year-old Pope, who has looked a bit beleaguered at the Vatican recently, wore a broad smile as he waved to a multitude that stretched several city blocks. People crowded the balconies and windows of office buildings, which were decorated with three-story-tall flower garlands.

Down at street level, the enthusiasm was palpable. Young people wore Pope T-shirts, families held homemade posters and everyone seemed to have flags that read: "Bem-vindo Papa Bento" (Welcome Pope Benedict). Many stood for hours in a light rain to attend the papal liturgy.

Secularism might have made inroads in Portuguese society, but that didn't dampen the excitement and happiness at hosting the German Pope. In Lisbon and Porto, he was given the keys to the city and, more importantly, seemed to have the sympathy of his listeners.

"We love the Pope, who he is and what he represents," said Elisabete Borges, a 30-year-old Catholic who stood behind a security barrier near the papal altar in Porto.

She said Pope Benedict appeals to people because of his intelligence and his willingness to confront the deeper issues in people's lives. Portuguese Catholics, she said, are well aware that the Pope has had to deal with problems resulting from the sex abuse crisis.

"I think he's helping to clarify the problem. He's not covering it up -- just the opposite -- and it's very important that people know this," she said.

The Pope and his aides have noticed the outpouring of good will and enthusiasm in Portugal. Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, the Vatican spokesman, said the pontiff appeared heartened by the reception at a time of trouble in the Church.

"What's happened over the last few months, with the problems of the abuse scandal, could lead one to think that attention and energy toward the Pope has been weakened, but that hasn't happened," Father Lombardi told reporters May 13.

"The fact that the strength of the faith is shown in such an evident way, in this situation, is very encouraging," he said.

In Porto, the people expressed gratitude for his visit though a variety of gifts, including a porcelain vase with the city's coat of arms, an anthology of local verse and poetry, and an ultralight guitar constructed of carbon fiber.

The most unusual gift was an innovation created by a former Catholic university student in Porto: a "VitalJacket," an electronic T-shirt that clinically monitors a person's heartbeat. This one was specially made in white.

Standing on the balcony of the Porto City Hall, Pope Benedict told the crowd he would happily extend his visit, but he had to return to Rome.

All along the Pope's motorcade route to the airport, residents hung out their best tablecloths and bedspreads as a visual greeting.

In his farewell address at the Porto airport, the Pope told Portuguese President Anibal Cavaco Silva and the crowd that gathered to say goodbye: "I shall long remember the heartfelt and affectionate welcome that you accorded me, the warmth and spontaneity with which bonds of communion were established with the groups that I was able to encounter."