Zagreb (Agenzia Fides) - "Christian families are a decisive resource for education in the faith, for the up-building of the Church as a communion and for her missionary presence in the most diverse situations in life" the Pope underlined during the Holy Mass presided on Sunday, June 5 at the Hippodrome in Zagreb, Croatia, on the occasion of the National Day of Catholic families in Croatia. After having expressed his appreciation for the attention and commitment to the family, the Pope urged the Pastors to “remain dedicated to this important pastoral commitment”, and he continued: “Everyone knows that the Christian family is a special sign of the presence and love of Christ and that it is called to give a specific and irreplaceable contribution to evangelization… The Christian family has always been the first way of transmitting the faith and still today retains great possibilities for evangelization in many areas”. Faced with the spread, especially in Europe, of a secularization that leads to the exclusion of God from life and to an increasing family breakdown, Benedict XVI noted that " by the grace of God, many Christian families today are acquiring an ever deeper awareness of their missionary vocation, and are devoting themselves seriously to bearing witness to Christ the Lord. Finally he concluded his homily with an exhortation: " hear yourselves called to evangelize with the whole of your life; hear the powerful word of the Lord: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations”
The 19th apostolic visit of Pope Benedict XVI began on Saturday, June 4. During the welcoming ceremony at the airport of Zagreb, the pope recalled the three pastoral visits to Croatia made by Blessed Pope John Paul II and "the long history of faithfulness that has linked the Country to the Holy See for over thirteen centuries. " Twenty years after the declaration of independence and on the eve of Croatia’s full integration into the European Union-recalled the Pope- this country’s remote and recent history can stimulate reflection on the part of all the other peoples of the Continent, helping them, individually and collectively, to preserve and to inject new life into that priceless common heritage of human and Christian values”.
During the meeting with representatives of the civil society and the political, cultural and business world, Diplomatic Corps and religious Leaders, held at the Croatian National Theatre in Zagreb, the Holy Father emphasized inter alia that " religion is not a separate area marked off from society. Rather, it is a natural element within society, constantly recalling the vertical dimension: attentive listening to God as the condition for seeking the common good, for seeking justice and reconciliation in the truth. Religion places man in relation with God, the Creator and Father of all, and must therefore be a force for peace. Religions need always to be purified according to their true essence in order to correspond to their true mission". Focusing on the theme of consciousness, the Pope noted that if, " according to the prevailing modern idea, conscience is reduced to the subjective field to which religion and morality have been banished, then the crisis of the West has no remedy and Europe is destined to collapse in on itself. If, on the other hand, conscience is rediscovered as the place in which to listen to truth and good, the place of responsibility before God and before fellow human beings – in other words, the bulwark against all forms of tyranny – then there is hope for the future".
Addressing the young people gathered in del Bano Josip Jelacic Square for a prayer vigil on the evening of June 4, the Holy Father said: "Jesus speaks to you today, through the Gospel and the Holy Spirit. He is your contemporary! He seeks you even before you seek him! While fully respecting your freedom, he approaches each one of you and offers himself as the authentic and decisive response to the longing deep within your hearts, to your desire for a life worth living. Let him take you by the hand! Let him become more and more your friend and companion along life’s journey. Put your trust in him and he will never disappoint you!
On the afternoon of Sunday, June 5, before returning to Rome, the Pope presided at the celebration of the Vespers in the Cathedral of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. Stephen's, attended by Bishops, priests, religious and seminarians, and paid homage at the tomb of Blessed Aloysius Stepinac, who " in his life, he always had his gaze fixed on Jesus, to whom he was always conformed, to the point of becoming a living image of Christ, and of Christ suffering - said Benedict XVI -. Precisely because of his strong Christian conscience, he knew how to resist every form of totalitarianism, becoming, in a time of Nazi and Fascist dictatorship, a defender of the Jews, the Orthodox and of all the persecuted, and then, in the age of communism, an ‘advocate’ for his own faithful, especially for the many persecuted and murdered priests. Yes, he became an advocate for God on this earth, since he tenaciously defended the truth and man’s right to live with God”.( SL) (Agenzia Fides 06/06/2011)
The 19th apostolic visit of Pope Benedict XVI began on Saturday, June 4. During the welcoming ceremony at the airport of Zagreb, the pope recalled the three pastoral visits to Croatia made by Blessed Pope John Paul II and "the long history of faithfulness that has linked the Country to the Holy See for over thirteen centuries. " Twenty years after the declaration of independence and on the eve of Croatia’s full integration into the European Union-recalled the Pope- this country’s remote and recent history can stimulate reflection on the part of all the other peoples of the Continent, helping them, individually and collectively, to preserve and to inject new life into that priceless common heritage of human and Christian values”.
During the meeting with representatives of the civil society and the political, cultural and business world, Diplomatic Corps and religious Leaders, held at the Croatian National Theatre in Zagreb, the Holy Father emphasized inter alia that " religion is not a separate area marked off from society. Rather, it is a natural element within society, constantly recalling the vertical dimension: attentive listening to God as the condition for seeking the common good, for seeking justice and reconciliation in the truth. Religion places man in relation with God, the Creator and Father of all, and must therefore be a force for peace. Religions need always to be purified according to their true essence in order to correspond to their true mission". Focusing on the theme of consciousness, the Pope noted that if, " according to the prevailing modern idea, conscience is reduced to the subjective field to which religion and morality have been banished, then the crisis of the West has no remedy and Europe is destined to collapse in on itself. If, on the other hand, conscience is rediscovered as the place in which to listen to truth and good, the place of responsibility before God and before fellow human beings – in other words, the bulwark against all forms of tyranny – then there is hope for the future".
Addressing the young people gathered in del Bano Josip Jelacic Square for a prayer vigil on the evening of June 4, the Holy Father said: "Jesus speaks to you today, through the Gospel and the Holy Spirit. He is your contemporary! He seeks you even before you seek him! While fully respecting your freedom, he approaches each one of you and offers himself as the authentic and decisive response to the longing deep within your hearts, to your desire for a life worth living. Let him take you by the hand! Let him become more and more your friend and companion along life’s journey. Put your trust in him and he will never disappoint you!
On the afternoon of Sunday, June 5, before returning to Rome, the Pope presided at the celebration of the Vespers in the Cathedral of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. Stephen's, attended by Bishops, priests, religious and seminarians, and paid homage at the tomb of Blessed Aloysius Stepinac, who " in his life, he always had his gaze fixed on Jesus, to whom he was always conformed, to the point of becoming a living image of Christ, and of Christ suffering - said Benedict XVI -. Precisely because of his strong Christian conscience, he knew how to resist every form of totalitarianism, becoming, in a time of Nazi and Fascist dictatorship, a defender of the Jews, the Orthodox and of all the persecuted, and then, in the age of communism, an ‘advocate’ for his own faithful, especially for the many persecuted and murdered priests. Yes, he became an advocate for God on this earth, since he tenaciously defended the truth and man’s right to live with God”.( SL) (Agenzia Fides 06/06/2011)
