Pope: Join with me in prayer for the people of Asia
On Sunday Pope Benedict XVI asked Christians world-wide to pray and show solidarity to the people of three Asian nations devastated by recent natural disasters. In an appeal launched after the midday Marian prayer.
“Dear brothers and sisters,My thoughts go at this time to the people of Asia, especially to the Philippines, the People’s Republic of China, hardest hit by violent rains, as well as those of the North-west Iran, hit by a violent earthquake. These events have caused numerous deaths and injuries, thousands of displaced people and extensive damage. I invite you to join me in prayer for those who have lost their lives and for all the people tried by such devastating calamities. May our solidarity and our support not be lacking to these our brothers and sisters.”
“Dear brothers and sisters,My thoughts go at this time to the people of Asia, especially to the Philippines, the People’s Republic of China, hardest hit by violent rains, as well as those of the North-west Iran, hit by a violent earthquake. These events have caused numerous deaths and injuries, thousands of displaced people and extensive damage. I invite you to join me in prayer for those who have lost their lives and for all the people tried by such devastating calamities. May our solidarity and our support not be lacking to these our brothers and sisters.”
Below is a translation of the Holy Father’s Angelus address:
Dear brothers and sisters,
The reading of the 6th chapter of the Gospel of John, who takes us on this Sunday in the liturgy, led us to reflect on the multiplication of the bread, which the Lord has fed a crowd of five thousand men, and on the invitation that Jesus addresses those who had satisfied to get busy for food that endures for eternal life. Jesus wants to help them understand the deeper meaning of the miracle that has worked: in a miraculous satisfy their physical hunger, they have to welcome the announcement that he is the bread which came down from heaven (cf. Jn 6:41), that satisfies in permanently. Even the Jewish people during the long journey in the desert, had experienced a bread that came down from heaven, manna, which had kept alive until the arrival in the promised land. Now, Jesus speaks of himself as the true bread which came down from heaven, able to keep alive not for a moment or a little way, but forever. He is the food that gives eternal life, because it is the only begotten Son of God, who is in the bosom of the Father, the man came to give life to the full, to introduce the man in the very life of God
In Jewish thought it was clear that the true bread from heaven, he felt Israel was the Law, the word of God the people of Israel recognized clearly that the Torah was the fundamental and lasting gift that Moses and the basic element distinguished him from other people was to know God's will and therefore the right way of life. Now Jesus, in the manifest as the bread of heaven, He testified that the Word of God Himself, the Word incarnate, through which man can do God's will his food (cf. Jn 4:34), which directs and supports its existence.
Then doubting the divinity of Jesus, as do the Jews of today's Gospel passage, is to oppose God's work, they in fact say: he is the son of Joseph! Know his father and mother! (Cf. Jn 6.42). They do not go beyond its earthly origins, and why I refuse to hosting up as the Word of God made flesh. St. Augustine, in his Commentary on the Gospel of John, explains: "They were far from that heavenly bread, and were unable to feel hunger. They had the mouth of the heart sick ... In fact, this bread takes the hunger of the inner man "(26.1). And we must ask ourselves if we really feel the hunger, the hunger for the Word of God, the hunger to know the true meaning of life. Only those who are attracted by God the Father, who hears him and lets himself be instructed by him can believe in Jesus, meeting a Lo and feed on him and thus find true life, the way of life, justice, truth, love. Augustine adds: "... the Lord said to be the bread that comes down from heaven, exhorting us to believe in him. Eat the living bread, in fact, is to believe in him. And who thinks, eats, so invisible is satisfied, as equally invisible reborn [a life deeper, true], born within, in her under becomes a new man" (ibid.).
Invoking Mary, ask her to guide us to the encounter with Jesus that our friendship with him is always more intense; ask her to introduce us into the full communion of love with her Son, the living bread which came down from heaven, so as to be renewed by him in depths of our being.
The reading of the 6th chapter of the Gospel of John, who takes us on this Sunday in the liturgy, led us to reflect on the multiplication of the bread, which the Lord has fed a crowd of five thousand men, and on the invitation that Jesus addresses those who had satisfied to get busy for food that endures for eternal life. Jesus wants to help them understand the deeper meaning of the miracle that has worked: in a miraculous satisfy their physical hunger, they have to welcome the announcement that he is the bread which came down from heaven (cf. Jn 6:41), that satisfies in permanently. Even the Jewish people during the long journey in the desert, had experienced a bread that came down from heaven, manna, which had kept alive until the arrival in the promised land. Now, Jesus speaks of himself as the true bread which came down from heaven, able to keep alive not for a moment or a little way, but forever. He is the food that gives eternal life, because it is the only begotten Son of God, who is in the bosom of the Father, the man came to give life to the full, to introduce the man in the very life of God
In Jewish thought it was clear that the true bread from heaven, he felt Israel was the Law, the word of God the people of Israel recognized clearly that the Torah was the fundamental and lasting gift that Moses and the basic element distinguished him from other people was to know God's will and therefore the right way of life. Now Jesus, in the manifest as the bread of heaven, He testified that the Word of God Himself, the Word incarnate, through which man can do God's will his food (cf. Jn 4:34), which directs and supports its existence.
Then doubting the divinity of Jesus, as do the Jews of today's Gospel passage, is to oppose God's work, they in fact say: he is the son of Joseph! Know his father and mother! (Cf. Jn 6.42). They do not go beyond its earthly origins, and why I refuse to hosting up as the Word of God made flesh. St. Augustine, in his Commentary on the Gospel of John, explains: "They were far from that heavenly bread, and were unable to feel hunger. They had the mouth of the heart sick ... In fact, this bread takes the hunger of the inner man "(26.1). And we must ask ourselves if we really feel the hunger, the hunger for the Word of God, the hunger to know the true meaning of life. Only those who are attracted by God the Father, who hears him and lets himself be instructed by him can believe in Jesus, meeting a Lo and feed on him and thus find true life, the way of life, justice, truth, love. Augustine adds: "... the Lord said to be the bread that comes down from heaven, exhorting us to believe in him. Eat the living bread, in fact, is to believe in him. And who thinks, eats, so invisible is satisfied, as equally invisible reborn [a life deeper, true], born within, in her under becomes a new man" (ibid.).
Invoking Mary, ask her to guide us to the encounter with Jesus that our friendship with him is always more intense; ask her to introduce us into the full communion of love with her Son, the living bread which came down from heaven, so as to be renewed by him in depths of our being.
