Pope Francis encouraged the faithful to be like Jesus, who excludes no one and loves everyone without labels, prejudices or adjectives; during his reflection before the Angelus prayer this Sunday, June 30 at the Vatican.
Before thousands of faithful present in St. Peter’s Square, under the heat of the Roman sun, the Holy Father reflected on the Gospel passage (Mk 5:21-43) in which Jesus allows himself to be touched by a hemorrhagic woman, whom healing; and in which he resurrects Jairus’ daughter.
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“Two miracles, one of healing and the other of resurrection. These two cures are told in a single episode. Both happen through physical contact. In fact, the woman touches Jesus’ robe and Jesus takes the little girl by the hand,” Pope Francis explained.
The Holy Father highlighted that in these two miracles there is physical contact with people considered impure, something that Jesus does not fear, which “challenges a mistaken religious conception, according to which God separates the pure on the one hand and the impure on the other. other. On the other hand, God does not make this separation, because we are all his children, and impurity does not derive from food, illnesses or even death, but comes from an impure heart.
“Let us learn this: in the face of suffering of body and spirit, in the face of wounds of the soul, in the face of situations that bring us down and even in the face of sin, God does not keep us at a distance, he is not ashamed of us, he does not judge us. ; On the contrary, He approaches to let Himself be touched and to touch us and always raises us from death,” Pope Francis stressed.
Pope Francis: God does not discriminate against anyone because he loves everyone
The Holy Father then encouraged to fix an image in the heart: “God is the one who takes you by the hand and lifts you up, the one who allows himself to be touched by your pain and touches you to heal you and give you life again. He does not discriminate against anyone because he loves everyone.”
And so, Pope Francis continued, “we can ask ourselves: Do we believe that God is like this? Do we allow ourselves to be touched by the Lord, by his Word, by his love? Do we enter into a relationship with our brothers by offering them a hand to get up or do we stay at a distance and label people based on our tastes and preferences?”
“We label people. I ask a question: Does God, the Lord Jesus, label people? Let each one respond. And I continually live labeling people?
To conclude, Pope Francis encouraged us to look “at the heart of God, because we need a Church and a society that do not exclude anyone, that do not treat anyone as ‘impure’, so that each one, with their own story, is welcomed. and loved without labels or prejudices, may it be loved without adjectives.”
Walter Sanchez Silva
I have been a husband since 2008. My wife and I have three children here and one who went to heaven in 2023, before he was born. Since I joined ACI Prensa in 2005, I have had the opportunity to cover various events of the Catholic Church. Among them, the World Youth Days in Cologne, Madrid and Rio de Janeiro and the apostolic trips of Pope Benedict XVI to Mexico and of Pope Francis to South Korea. I have been sent to the Vatican to cover the Family synods, in 2015; of the Amazon, in 2019 and that of Synodality, in 2023. I closely follow the situation of the Catholic Church in Nicaragua, which suffers persecution from the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega, as well as current ecclesiastical events in the region.