Mission
Hot Topics
Fatherhood and motherhood reshape the importance people place on marriage, according to a study
The Hillbilly Thomists – the Dominican friars who sing- Release Sixth Album, ‘Strange Land’
Israel and Jordan Prepare to Celebrate the Bi-Millennium of the Baptism of Jesus Christ
How popular is Pope Leo XIV in the six countries with the largest Catholic populations in Latin America in 2026? Research findings are published
Questions about liturgy: Blessings of Married Couples
How Can We Recognize God’s Presence? Leo XIV Offers a Thoughtful Response Based on a Passage from the Gospel
Catholic Church in the US and Europe Strengthens Legal Measures to Address Fraudulent Abuse Allegations
Another change (and not a minor one): Leo XIV completely replaces Pope Francis’s Vatican law
The Vatican Discloses Its Financial Statements for 2026: Here Are the Numbers—and the Challenges Ahead
Leo XIV, the Shrine of Lourdes, and Rupnik’s mosaics: a papal visit as new evidence emerges against the former Jesuit
Categoría

Archive for the ‘Angelus’ Category

* * *

Dear brothers and sisters, hello!

The fourth Sunday of the Easter Season is characterized by the Gospel of the Good Shepherd that we read every year. Today’s passage cites these words of Jesus: “My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they know me and follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish. No one can take them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one can take them out of the Father’s hand. The Father and I are one” (John 10:27-30). These 4 verses contain Jesus’ whole message, the central nucleus of his Gospel: he calls us to participate in his relationship with the Father, and this is eternal life.

Jesus wants to establish a relationship with his friends that is the reflection of the one he himself has with the Father: a relation of mutual belonging in total confidence, in intimate communion. Jesus uses the image of the shepherd and his sheep to express this profound shared understanding, this relationship of friendship. The shepherd calls his sheep and they recognize his voice, they respond to his call and follow him. This is a beautiful parable! The mystery of the voice is suggestive: we think about how from our mother’s womb we learn to recognize her voice and our father’s voice; from the tone of someone’s voice we can perceive love or scorn, affection or coldness. Jesus’s voice is unique! If we learn to distinguish it from others, he will lead us along the path of life, a path that stretches even beyond death.

But Jesus at a certain point says, referring to his sheep: “My Father, who gave them to me...” (John 10:29). This is very important, it is a profound mystery, it is not easy to understand: if I feel attracted by Jesus, if his voice warms my heart, it is thanks to God the Father, who has placed in me the desire for love, for truth, for life, for beauty... and Jesus is all of this in its fullness! This helps us to understand the mystery of vocation, especially of calls to a special consecration. Sometimes Jesus calls us, invites us to follow him, but perhaps it occurs that we do not realize that it is him, as happened to the young Samuel. There are many young people here today in the piazza. There are a lot of you, no? We see... Aha! There are many young people here today in the piazza. I would like to ask you: Have you heard the Lord’s voice at some time in a desire, in upheaval, invite you to follow him more closely? Have you heard it? I can’t hear you. Okay... Have you wanted to be apostles of Jesus? Youth must be placed at the service of great ideals. Do you think so? Do you agree? Ask Jesus what he wants of you and be courageous! Be courageous! Ask him! Behind and prior to every vocation to the priesthood or the consecrated life there is always someone’s powerful and intense prayer: a grandmother’s, a grandfather’s, a mother’s, a father’s, a community’s... This is why Jesus said: “Pray to the Lord of the harvest,” that is, God the Father, “that he might send workers for the harvest!” (Matthew 9:38). Vocations are born in prayer and from prayer; and only in prayer can they persevere and bear fruit. I would like to underscore this today, which is the World Day of Prayer for Vocations. Let us pray in particular for the new priests of the Diocese of Rome, whom I had the joy to ordain this morning. And let us invoke Mary’s intercession. Today there were 10 young men who said “Yes” to Jesus and were ordained priests this morning... This is beautiful! Let us invoke Mary’s intercession, she who is the Woman of “Yes.” Mary said “Yes” her whole life! She learned to recognize Jesus’ voice from the time she carried him in her womb. Mary our Mother, help us to recognize Jesus’ voice always better and to follow it to walk along the path of life! Thank you.

Thanks so much for the greeting, but greet Jesus too. Cry out “Jesus,” loudly... Let us all pray together to Our Lady.

[Following the recitation of the Regina Caeli the Holy Father made the following remarks:]

I am attentively following the events unfolding in Venezuela. I follow them with much concern, with intense prayer and with the hope that just and peaceful means are sought to get through this time of grave difficulty that the country is experiencing. I invite the dear Venezuelan people, in a special way institutional leaders and politicians, firmly to reject any sort of violence and to establish dialogue based upon truth in mutual respect, in pursuit of the common good and in love for the nation. I call upon believers to pray and to work for reconciliation and peace. Let us join together in a prayer full of hope for Venezuela, placing her in the hands of Our Lady of Coromoto.

My thoughts also go out to those affected by the earthquake in southwest continental China. Let us pray for the victims and for those who are suffering because of this violent quake.

This afternoon in Sondrio, Italy Don Nicolò Rusca will be proclaimed blessed. He was a Valtellinese priest who lived sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. He was an exemplary parish priest in Sondrio and was killed during the political and religious struggles of that tormented Europe at that time. Let us praise the Lord for his witness!

[Concluding, the Holy Father said:]

Have a good Sunday and a good lunch!

[Translation by Joseph Trabbic]

Angelus

On Listening to the Lord's Call

Dear brothers and sisters!   In today’s liturgy the Gospel according to Luke presents the account of the calling of the first disciples. This version is original with respect to the other 2 synoptic Gospels, Matthew and Mark (Matthew 4:18-22; Mark 1:16-20). The call, in fact, is preceded by Jesus’ teaching of the crowds and of a miraculous catch of fish, accomplished by the Lord’s will (Luke 5:1-6). While the crowd gathers on the shore of the Lake of Genesaret to listen to Jesus he sees Simon who is discouraged because he had not caught anything all night. First he asks Simon if he might get into the boat to preach to the people a little ways from the shore; then when he finishes preaching he commands him to set out into the lake with his companions and cast out the nets (5:5). Simon obeys and they catch a great quantity of fish. In this way the evangelist makes us see how the first disciples followed Jesus, entrusting themselves to him, basing themselves on his word, which is also accompanied by wondrous signs. Let us observe that before this sign, Simon speaks to Jesus calling him “Master” (5:5), while afterward he calls him “Lord” (5:7). It is the pedagogy of God’s call, which is not much concerned with the qualities of the elect but with their faith, like that of Simon, who says: “At your word I will cast out the nets” (5:5).   The image of the catch of fish points to the mission of the Church. St. Augustine comments on this: “Twice the disciples fish at the Lord’s command: once before the passions and once after the resurrection. In both cases we find a figure of the whole Church: the Church as she is now and as she will be after the resurrection of the dead. Now she contains a multitude impossible to count, including the good and the bad together; after the resurrection she will only contain the good” (Sermon 248, 1). Peter’s experience, certainly singular, is also representative of the call of every apostle of the Gospel, who must never be discouraged in proclaiming Christ to all men, to the ends of the earth. But the text of today’s Gospel also brings us to reflect on the vocation to the priesthood and the consecrated. It is the work of God. Man is not the author of his own vocation, but he replies to the divine proposal; and human weakness must not trouble us if God calls. We must have confidence in his strength, which acts precisely in our poverty; we must more and more place our trust in the power of his mercy, which transforms and renews.   Dear brothers and sisters, may this Word of God revive in us too and in our Christian communities the courage, the confidence and the zeal to proclaim and witness to the Gospel. Failures and difficulties must not lead to discouragement: we are expected to cast out the nets with faith, the Lord does the rest. Let us trust in the intercession of the Virgin Mary, Queen of the Apostles. Quite aware of her littleness, she responds to the Lord’s call with total trust: “Here I am.” With her maternal aid let us renew our openness to follow Jesus, Master and Lord.