Vatican City, 27 April 2014 (VIS) –
Half a million people attended the ceremony held this morning in St.
Peter's Square for the canonisation of the “two Pope saints”: John XXIII
and John Paul II. Since it was opened to the public at 5 a.m., the
square and its environs were filled with faithful from all over the
world; Polish pilgrims, however, constituted one of the largest groups.
The event was also attended by delegations from over a hundred
countries, more than twenty Heads of State and many figures from the
world of politics and culture, including the King Juan Carlos and Queen
Sofia of Spain, King Albert II and Queen Paola of Belgium, Prince
Hans-Adam II of Liechtenstein, Grand Duke Henri of Luxembourg, the
ex-president of the Republic of Poland Lech Walesa, the president of the
Argentine parliament Julian Dominguez and the presidents of the
European Union, Herman Van Rompuy, and the European Commission, Jose
Manuel Barroso. The celebration was also attended by Floribeth Mora Diaz
and Sister Adele Labianca, the carer of Caterina Capitani – the two
women who experienced the miracles attributed to John Paul II.
Banners
with portraits of the two saints – the same ones used for their
respective beatifications – were displayed on the facade of the
Basilica. In the square, adorned with more than 30,000 roses from
Ecuador, and in Via della Conciliazione, hundreds of thousands of
faithful prepared for the celebration by reciting the chaplet of Divine
Mercy, intercalated with texts from the magisterium of both pontiffs and
preceded by the Hymn to Blessed John XXIII, “Good Shepherd of Christ's
flock”. The prayer ended with the Hymn to Blessed John Paul II, “Open
the doors to Christ”.
Under
intermittent rain, and during litanies invoking the protection of the
saints, there began the procession of concelebrating cardinals and
bishops who, before taking their places, greeted Pope emeritus Benedict
XVI, who also concelebrated alongside the Holy Father. A few minutes
after 10 a.m., Pope Francis entered the square and, before proceeding
with the rite for the proclamation of the new saints, greeted and
embraced the Pope emeritus.
Moments
later Cardinal Angelo Amato S.D.B:, prefect of the Congregation for the
Causes of Saints, accompanied by the postulators, asked Pope Francis to
inscribe the names of the two Blessed Popes in the Book of Saints, and
the Holy Father pronounced the formula for canonisation:
“For
the honour of the Blessed Trinity, the exaltation of the Catholic faith
and the increase of the Christian life, by the authority of our Lord
Jesus Christ, and of the Holy Apostles Peter and Paul, and own own,
after due deliberation and frequent prayer for divine assistance, and
having sought the counsel of many of our brother Bishops, we declare and
define Blessed
John XXIII
John Paul II
be Saints and we enrol them among the Saints, decreeing that they are to be venerated as such by the whole Church.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen”.
This
was followed by the presentation to the Pope of the relics of the two
saints, which were displayed on the altar throughout the ceremony; these
were a phial of the blood of John Paul II, which had been displayed on 1
May 2011, and a piece of skin removed from the body of John XXIII when
it was exhumed for his beatification on 3 September 2000.
Following
the Gospel reading, the Holy Father pronounced a homily in which he
defined St. John XXIII as “the Pope of openness to the Holy Spirit”, and
St. John Paul II as “the Pope of the Family”, recalling that “at the
heart of this Sunday, which concludes the Octave of Easter and which
John Paul II wished to dedicate to Divine Mercy, are the glorious wounds
of the risen Jesus”.
“He had already
shown those wounds when he first appeared to the Apostles on the very
evening of that day following the Sabbath, the day of the resurrection”,
he continued. “But Thomas was not there that evening, and when the
others told him that they had seen the Lord, he replied that unless he
himself saw and touched those wounds, he would not believe. A week
later, Jesus appeared once more to the disciples gathered in the Upper
Room, and Thomas was present; Jesus turned to him and told him to touch
his wounds.
Whereupon that man, so straightforward and accustomed to
testing everything personally, knelt before Jesus with the words: 'My
Lord and my God!'.
“The wounds of
Jesus are a scandal, a stumbling block for faith, yet they are also the
test of faith. That is why on the body of the risen Christ the wounds
never pass away: they remain, for those wounds are the enduring sign of
God’s love for us. They are essential for believing in God. Not for
believing that God exists, but for believing that God is love, mercy and
faithfulness. Saint Peter, quoting Isaiah, writes to Christians: 'by
his wounds you have been healed'.
“John
XXIII and John Paul II were not afraid to look upon the wounds of
Jesus, to touch his torn hands and his pierced side”, exclaimed Pope
Francis. “They were not ashamed of the flesh of Christ, they were not
scandalised by him, by his cross; they did not despise the flesh of
their brother, because they saw Jesus in every person who suffers and
struggles. These were two men of courage, filled with the parrhesia of
the Holy Spirit, and they bore witness before the Church and the world
to God’s goodness and mercy.
“They
were priests, bishops and popes of the twentieth century. They lived
through the tragic events of that century, but they were not overwhelmed
by them. For them, God was more powerful; faith was more powerful –
faith in Jesus Christ the Redeemer of man and the Lord of history; the
mercy of God, shown by those five wounds, was more powerful; and more
powerful too was the closeness of Mary our Mother.
“In
these two men, who looked upon the wounds of Christ and bore witness to
his mercy, there dwelt a living hope and an indescribable and glorious
joy. The hope and the joy which the risen Christ bestows on his
disciples, the hope and the joy which nothing and no one can take from
them. The hope and joy of Easter, forged in the crucible of self-denial,
self-emptying, utter identification with sinners, even to the point of
disgust at the bitterness of that chalice. Such were the hope and the
joy which these two holy popes had received as a gift from the risen
Lord and which they in turn bestowed in abundance upon the People of
God, meriting our eternal gratitude.
“This
hope and this joy were palpable in the earliest community of believers,
in Jerusalem, as we read in the Acts of the Apostles. It was a
community which lived the heart of the Gospel, love and mercy, in
simplicity and fraternity.
“This is
also the image of the Church which the Second Vatican Council set before
us. John XXIII and John Paul II cooperated with the Holy Spirit in
renewing and updating the Church in keeping with her pristine features,
those features which the saints have given her throughout the centuries.
Let us not forget that it is the saints who give direction and growth
to the Church. In convening the Council, John XXIII showed an exquisite
openness to the Holy Spirit. He let himself be led and he was for the
Church a pastor, a servant-leader. This was his great service to the
Church; he was the pope of openness to the Spirit.
“In
his own service to the People of God, John Paul II was the pope of the
family. He himself once said that he wanted to be remembered as the pope
of the family. I am particularly happy to point this out as we are in
the process of journeying with families towards the Synod on the family.
It is surely a journey which, from his place in heaven, he guides and
sustains”.
The Holy Father concluded.
“May these two new saints and shepherds of God’s people intercede for
the Church, so that during this two-year journey toward the Synod she
may be open to the Holy Spirit in pastoral service to the family. May
both of them teach us not to be scandalised by the wounds of Christ and
to enter ever more deeply into the mystery of divine mercy, which always
hopes and always forgives, because it always loves”.
St.
Peter's Basilica will remain open today from 2 to 10 p.m., to enable
pilgrims to venerate the bodies of the two canonised Popes displayed in
glass cases, to which the word “Saint” has been added.
credits: http://www.news.va/en/news/john-xxiii-and-john-paul-ii-inscribed-in-the-book
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