“We must not be afraid! We must open ourselves up to the Lord,” Pope Francis reflected during a brief address before praying the midday Angelus on Sunday with crowds gathered in St. Peter’s Square.
The Pontiff discussed the Gospel of the day’s liturgy, in which Jesus restores the sight of the man born blind. The miracle immediately resulted in the religious leaders interrogating the man and his parents, and trying to deny evidence of the miracle.
Pope Francis explained how the man proclaimed Jesus as a prophet. The man truly believed and Jesus revealed his identity to him as the Messiah. Although that man was no longer blind, those around him “sunk deeper into their interior blindness.” The Holy Father asked those present to examine this irony.
He also posed a question to the thousands present in the square: “Do I have an open heart or a closed one?” He asked, are we open or closed to God and to our neighbors.
Pope Francis invited the faithful “to open yourselves up to the light of Christ to bear fruit in our life, to eliminate our non-Christian ways of acting.”
He also told the faithful to recognize that they are vulnerable to acting like the doctors of the law and begin to judge others.
He continued, “We must repent. We must stop acting in these ways so we can set out decisively on the road of sanctity.”
The Holy Father called the faithful to “walk as ‘Children of Light,'” as St. Paul had written (Ephesians 5:8), and to turn to the Virgin Mary during this Lenten journey.
After praying the Angelus, the Pope greeted some of the various groups present.
He also gave the faithful homework: “Don’t forget when you get home, open the Gospel of John, Chapter 9 and read the Gospel of the blind man who was given sight and of the people who were thought to have sight who sank deeper into their blindness.” (D.C.L)
—
On ZENIT’s Web page:
Full translation: http://www.zenit.org/en/articles/on-coming-to-the-light
