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Liturgy, in truth, is an event by means of which we let ourselves be introduced into the expansive faith and prayer of the Church. This is the reason why the early Christians prayed facing east, in the direction of the rising sun, the symbol of the returning Christ.
Pope Benedict XVI
In the 20th century, in the darkest period of German and European history, an insane racist ideology, born of neopaganism, gave rise to the attempt, planned and systematically carried out by the regime, to exterminate European Jews. The result has passed into history as the Shoah.
We let ourselves be molded and transformed by Christ and continually pass from the side of one who destroys to that of the one who saves.
The Christian faith can never be separated from the soil of sacred events, from the choice made by God, who wanted to speak to us, to become man, to die and rise again, in a particular place and at a particular time.
At any rate, we can see that they are given into our care, that we cannot just do whatever we want with them. Animals, too, are God's creatures.
Down through the centuries, the Czech Republic, the territory of the Czech Republic has been a place of cultural exchange.
Attempts to construct an ethic from the rules of evolution, or from psychology and sociology, end up being simply inadequate.
It is of great concern that the fabric of African life, its very source of hope and stability, is threatened by divorce, abortion, prostitution, human trafficking, and a contraception mentality.
The new pope knows that his task is to make the light of Christ shine before men and women of world - not his own light, but that of Christ.
Every State has the primary duty to protect its own population from grave and sustained violations of human rights, as well as from the consequences of humanitarian crises, whether natural or man-made.
My plans never progressed as far as a clear desire for a family.
The fact that the Lord can work and act even with insufficient means consoles me, and above all I entrust myself to your prayers.
If the protection of the environment involves costs, they should be justly distributed, taking due account of the different levels of development of various countries and the need for solidarity with future generations.
When the danger is great, one must not run away.
To me, it really seems visible today that ethics is not something exterior to the economy, which, as technical matter, could function on its own; rather, ethics is an interior principle of the economy itself, which cannot function if it does not take account of the human values of solidarity and reciprocal responsibility.
Each generation, as it seeks to advance the common good, must ask anew: 'What are the requirements that governments may reasonably impose upon citizens, and how far do they extend? By appeal to what authority can moral dilemmas be resolved?'
Those who love desire to share with the beloved. They want to be one with the beloved, and Sacred Scripture shows us the great love story of God for his people which culminated in Jesus Christ.
The prevailing mentality was that the Church must not be a Church of laws but, rather, a Church of love; she must not punish. Thus, the awareness that punishment can be an act of love ceased to exist. This led to an odd darkening of the mind, even in very good people.
Since politics fundamentally should be a moral enterprise, the church in this sense has something to say about politics.
The real 'action' in the liturgy in which we are all supposed to participate is the action of God himself. This is what is new and distinctive about the Christian liturgy: God himself acts and does what is essential.
True friends challenge us and help us to be faithful on our journey.
It is absolutely important to make accessible the Gospel for all people and also understandable for Jewish people.
We can see that the sacramental presence of the Lord in the Eucharist is an essential gift for us and give us also the possibility to love the others and to work for the others.
I too hope in this short reign to be a man of peace.
Mercy is what moves us toward God, while justice makes us tremble in his sight.
All the great works of art, the cathedrals - the Gothic cathedrals and the splendid Baroque churches - are a luminous sign of God, and thus are truly a manifestation, an epiphany of God.
The traditional teaching of the church has proven to be the only failsafe way to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS.
There are those who argue that the public celebration of festivals such as Christmas should be discouraged, in the questionable belief that it might somehow offend those of other religions or none.
God does not become more divine when we push him away from us in a sheer, impenetrable voluntarism; rather, the truly divine God is the God who has revealed himself as logos and, as logos, has acted and continues to act lovingly on our behalf.
The Church is not self-made, it was created by God and is continuously formed by Him. This finds expression in the Sacraments, above all in that of Baptism: I enter into the Church not by a bureaucratic act, but with the help of this Sacrament.
An important function of theology is to keep religion tied to reason and reason to religion. Both roles are of essential importance for humanity.
I wrote the text of the resignation. I cannot say with precision when, but at the most two weeks before. I wrote it in Latin because something so important you do in Latin. Furthermore, Latin is a language in which I know well how to write in a more appropriate way.
Art is elemental. Reason alone as it's expressed in the sciences can't be man's complete answer to reality, and it can't express everything that man can, wants to, and has to express. I think God built this into man. Art along with science is the highest gift God has given him.
In our heart, in the heart of each of you, let there be always the joyous certainty that the Lord is near, that he does not abandon us, that he is near to us, and that he surrounds us with his love.
It is important to be in the 'we' of the Church, in the 'we' of the life of the Liturgy.
I would like everyone to feel loved by the God who gave his son for us and showed us his boundless love. I want everyone to feel the joy of being Christian.
It's a great responsibility before God, the judge who guides us, who draws us to truth and good, and in this sense the church must unmask evil, rendering present the goodness of God, rendering present his truth, the truly infinite for which we are thirsty.
A weak point of mine was maybe little resolve in governing and making decisions.
Both need each other: The agnostic cannot be content to not know, but must be in search of the great truth of faith; the Catholic cannot be content to have faith, but must be in search of God all the time, and in the dialogue with others, a Catholic can learn more about God in a deeper fashion.
God in fact does not change: he is faithful to himself.
The truth touches us. We try to be guided by this contact.
To me, its seems necessary to rediscover - and the energy to do so exists - that even the political and economic spheres need moral responsibility, a responsibility that is born in man's heart and, in the end, has to do with the presence or absence of God.
In the name of freedom, there has to be a correlation between rights and duties, by which every person is called to assume responsibility for his or her choices, made as a consequence of entering into relations with others.
I no longer wield the power of the office for the government of the church, but in the service of prayer I remain, so to speak, within St. Peter's bounds. St. Benedict, whose name I bear as pope, shall be a great example in this for me. He showed us the way to a life which, active or passive, belongs wholly to the work of God.
In Latin America in general, it's very important that Christianity not be simply a thing of reason, but also of the heart.
On the one hand, faith is a profoundly personal contact with God, which touches me in my innermost being and places me in front of the living God in absolute immediacy in such a way that I can speak with Him, love Him, and enter into communion with Him.
In the harshness of the world of technology - in which feelings do not count anymore - the hope for a saving love grows, a love which would be given freely and generously.
We need Grace and forgiveness.
We pray that the Lord may help us to produce His light in ourselves, even in dark days, so that we might be light for others, illuminating the world and life in this world.
We have to see that the human person needs the infinite. If God's not there, if the infinite isn't available, the human person creates its own paradises, giving the appearance of 'infinitude' that can only be a lie.
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