Pope Francis Monthly Prayer Intentions
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Each year, the Holy Father asks for our prayers for a specific intention each month. You are invited to answer the Holy Father’s request and to join with many people worldwide in praying for this intention each month
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That young people, especially in Latin America, follow the example of Mary and respond to the call of the Lord to communicate the joy of the Gospel to the world.
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January Reflection by Fr. Jacob Boddicker – Young People and the Example of Mary
The world ushers in a New Year each January, so named after the Latin word for “door”: we stand on the threshold of another Year of Our Lord. It is the world’s New Year; as a Church we’ve already celebrated the new liturgical year with the First Sunday of Advent, a season in which we prepared for the coming of the New Man. December is a month of celebrating something new—a child!—while the world around us sees only what is old, thinks only about the past year. Now the world looks to the New Year and we, instead, look to Mary: we thus begin with the great Solemnity of Mary, the Mother of God on January 1st.
Mary guards the threshold of the world’s New Year, she who is hailed as the “gate of heaven, star of the sea”: she through whom the Son of God entered into a dying humanity. The world shouts “Happy New Year” while we say “Hail Mary!” Why? In Advent we prepared for the birth of Christ, and now we prepare to go out into the world and echo the message of the angels: “…a savior has been born for you who is Messiah and Lord” (Luke 2:10-11). We now look to another year of living our faith in a world that increasingly resists the joy of the Gospel, which says there is no room for the Son of God. We ask Mary, who emptied herself that she might contain the living Word of God, to make room in us, that like her we might bear Christ into the world. Mary bore Christ with her wherever she went; this year let us do likewise.
-Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network
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That people, who are involved in the service and transmission of faith, may find, in their dialogue with culture, a language suited to the conditions of the present time.
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Merciful Father,
Throughout November, we pray in the service of peace. In this age of conflict, we pray that the language of love and dialogue may always prevail over the language of conflict.
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Following Pope Francis, the Faith Formation students made Pinwheels of Peace with prayers for Peace throughout the world.
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We all want peace. It is desired above all by those who suffer its absence.
We can speak with splendid words, but if there is no peace in our heart, there will be no peace in the world.
With zero violence and 100 percent tenderness, let us build the evangelical peace that excludes no one.
Let us pray together that the language of love and dialogue may always prevail over the language of conflict.
–Pope Francis, November 6 2018
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Reflections
Pope at Mass: humility, gentleness and patience lead to peace
Article By Robin Gomes, Vatican News
The path to peace in the world, in our societies and also in our families is that of humility, gentleness, and patience. This was the heart of the message of Pope Francis in his homily at Mass Friday morning at the Casa Santa Marta in the Vatican.
He was reflecting on the day’s First Reading, where St. Paul from the solitude of his imprisonment was writing to the Ephesians a true “hymn to unity”, recalling the “dignity of vocation”.
Difficulty in making peace
The Pope observed that Paul’s solitude would accompany him until his death in Rome, because Christians were “too busy” in their “internal struggles”. And before Paul, he said, Jesus Himself “asked for the grace of unity from the Father for all of us.”
Yet, the Pope noted, today we are “used to breathing the air of conflict”. Every day, on the TV and in newspapers, we hear about conflicts and wars “one after the other”, “without peace, without unity”. Agreements made to stop conflicts, he said, are ignored, thus the arms race and preparation for war and destruction go ahead.
The Pope noted that even world institutions created with the best of intentions for peace and unity, fail to come to an agreement because of a veto here and an interest there … While they are struggling to arrive at peace agreements, children have no food, no school, no education and hospitals because the war has destroyed everything.
The Holy Father noted there is a tendency to destruction, war and disunity in us. It is the tendency that the devil, the enemy and destroyer of humanity sows in our hearts. Referring to Paul the Pope said the Apostle teaches us that the journey of unity is, so to say, clad or “armoured’ with the bond of peace. Peace, he said, leads to unity.
Opening hearts
The Pope then encouraged all to adopt a behaviour that is worthy of “the call” that is received, “with all humility, gentleness and patience”.
The Holy Father said that we who are used to insulting and shouting at each other, need to make peace and unity among us with gentleness and patience “.
The Pope urged Christians to open their hearts and make peace in the world taking the path of the “three little things” – “humility, gentleness and patience”. He drew attention to the practical advice of Paul to “bear with one another in love”. The Holy Father acknowledged it’s easy not as there is always a judgement, a condemnation which leads to separation and distances…
Agreement at the start
The Pope also pointed out that when a rift is created between members of the family, the devil is happy with the start of war . The advice is then to bear with one another because we always have an excuse to be annoyed and impatient because we are all sinners with defects. St. Paul, inspired by Jesus at the Last Supper who urged for “one body and one spirit”, thus urges us to “preserve the unity of spirit through the bond of peace”.
The next step, the Pope said is to see the horizon of peace with God, just as Jesus made us see the horizon of peace with prayer: “Father, may they be one, as You and I are one’. The Pope recalled the day’s Gospel of Luke where Jesus advises us to strike an agreement with our adversary along the way. The Pope said it’s good advice, because “it is not difficult to come to an agreement at the beginning of a conflict”.
The Pope said the advice of Jesus is to settle the matter and make peace at the beginning, which calls for humility, gentleness and patience. One can build peace throughout the world with these little things, which are the attitudes of Jesus who is humble, meek and forgives everything.
The Pope said that today we, the world, our families and our society need peace. He invited Christians to start putting into practice humility, gentleness and patience saying this is the path to making peace and consolidating unity.
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