Both saints, the pope told the friars, spent long hours in the confessional as ministers of God’s mercy and forgiveness.
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Cinderella had to wallow in ashes and trust the deprivation and humiliation she was experiencing was necessary before she was ready to be transformed for the royal ball, he said, addressing the school children in the front pews.
Pope Francis is scheduled to begin a five-day visit to Mexico on Friday. “Before us there is not sin, but the penitent sinner – A person that feels the desire to be accepted and pardoned”. Pope Francis intends to visit Azerbaijan, APA reports quoting TASS.
The reason for such a “solemn and heartfelt appeal” is because Christ knows how fragile we are as sinners, Francis observed.
“Dear brothers, may you be able to help open the doors of people’s hearts” as well as “bless, heal and raise them up” with a father’s love, he said. “They may also absolve a priest who has had sexual relations with someone and offers forgiveness for the act”, explained Fr. Dexter Toledo, provincial secretary of the Order of the Friars Minor (OFM) in the Philippines, in a CBCP News post.
“It’s not easy to go before another person, knowing he represents God, and confess one’s sins”, he said.
Millions are expected to turn out to welcome the the first pope from the Americas in a country of 120 million people which is home to the second largest Catholic community in the world, after Brazil.
He said the Lord asks people to close the distance that has grown and “return to me with your whole heart”. It’s the mystery of sin: “we have distanced ourselves from God, from others, from ourselves”.
The screening is part of a Lenten series about the spirituality of Pope Francis, who called an Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy to last from December 8 to November 20.
Turning to the day’s Gospel reading from Matthew, the Pope said it invites us to become “protagonists” in our own conversion by embracing the “three remedies, three medicines”, of prayer, charity and fasting and penance, “which heal from sin”.
The Vatican announced the pope-patriarch meeting February 5 and, on February 8, released an updated itinerary for Pope Francis’ trip.
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Illegal immigration is a major issue in the USA presidential election campaign with Republican hopeful Donald Trump vowing to put up a wall along the border if he is elected and forcing Mexico to pay for it. “We’re looking for discernment from him on what he wants from us and how we get there”.
