Opening of the Year of Mercy
Fifty years ago, at the close of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, Paul VI, in the name of the bishops of the whole world, with the documents of the council meeting, drawn up over many months of work, entrusted the whole Church with the task of being a Samaritan of 'humanity. The Church "expert in humanity" listened to the suggestions of the Holy Spirit in harmony with listening to the joys and sufferings of all humanity. The conciliar documents are words matured on the wavelength of a pastoral commitment in the attempt to provide the Church itself, "Mother and Teacher", with valid tools in giving a soul to time and a divine spark to Christians committed to building that planned Kingdom by Christ with his presence among us realized with his Resurrection.
At the closing of the Council, the bishops on that occasion wanted to deliver a particular message to the different categories of Samaritans committed to helping the wounded in this "field hospital" of our humanity wounded in a thousand ways. In that group of representatives, alongside men of culture, artists, scientists, women and young people, there was also a guest of the Opera Don Guanella who was given the message of the Council for «the poor, the sick and all those who suffer." The bishops heard the groans of the poor and the suffering and the Church «feels imploring eyes upon itself, burning with fever or clouded by tiredness, questioning glances which seek in vain the reason for human suffering and which anxiously ask when and where the comfort…".
Even today, more than ever, the Don Guanella Society feels like the bearer of this message to translate into concrete life the assistance to the Samaritans, relegated "half dead" on the side of our roads traveled by haste and indifference. The Jubilee Year of Mercy is a solicitation to live this liturgical year with passion with feelings of "Samaritan" compassion in putting people wounded in life on their feet and envisaging a future warm with love and understanding. That "monumental wealth of faith", which the Council built, needs a renewed springtime to illuminate with the colors of hope the fatigue of living polluted and weighed down by the poisons of sin which lead us to plan our lives independently of God's will .
The captivity of sin paralyzes good qualities and cultivates the fruits of enmity which, in turn, continually threatens the life of men to set them against God's plan. Opening the Holy Door, Pope Francis said that "the history of sin is understandable only in the light of forgiving love. Only in this light can sin be understood. If everything remained relegated to sin, we would be the most desperate of creatures, while the promise of the victory of Christ's love encloses everything in the mercy of the Father". In the homily of the opening Mass of the Jubilee of Mercy, Pope Francis maintained that «The Council was an encounter. A true encounter between the Church and the men of our time. An encounter marked by the strength of the Spirit who impelled his Church to emerge from the shallows which for many years had enclosed her within herself, to resume her missionary journey with enthusiasm. It was the resumption of a path to meet every man where he lives: in the city, in his house, in his workplace ». “It will be a year in which to grow in awareness of mercy.
How much wrong is done to God and to his grace when it is affirmed above all that sins are punished by his judgment, without putting forward instead that they are forgiven by his mercy! Yes, that's right. We must put mercy before judgment, and in any case God's judgment will always be in the light of his mercy. Therefore, going through the Holy Door makes us feel part of this mystery of love and tenderness". After the opening of the Holy Door on the day of the Immaculate Conception, Pope Francis invited us to look at Mary's face "with trusting love and to contemplate her in all her splendour, imitating her faith" because "the Virgin Mary, never infected by sin, is mother of a new humanity". «Celebrating the Feast of the Immaculate Conception therefore requires – the Pope recommended – to fully welcome God and his merciful grace on our lives and to become, in turn, creators of mercy, through an authentic evangelical path» then «this the feast of the Immaculate Conception then becomes the feast of all of us if, with our daily "yes", we manage to overcome our selfishness and make the lives of our brothers and sisters happier, to give them hope, wiping away a few tears and giving a little of joy".