The Pope usually celebrates Mass at the first station Church - Santa Sabina; today was different (Station Churches if you want to follow us this Lent on your own). To accommodate more people who may want to come to Mass with the Pope he moved it to St. Peter's Basilica.
All of a sudden, the Pope needs priests to provide him a service, to distribute ashes and Holy Communion. After getting back from class and my mini pilgrimage to the Cathedra and St. Peter's Square, I learned the NAC was asked to help. Thanks to a loving secretary, the last ticket came to me.
We vested in the Blessed Sacrament Chapel and sat right behind the altar. Many faithful, deacons, priests, bishops and cardinals were there. It was somber and surreal. I got to pray with the Pope at his last Mass. The first time I got to pray with him was at World Youth Day Cologne 2005. Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger once wrote:
"One gets to know John Paul II best by concelebrating Mass with him, by letting oneself be drawn into the intense silence of his prayer, more than by analyzing his books or speeches. By participating in his prayer, one moves beyond words and into his very being". (written for JP2's 20th anniversary as Pope, 1998).
Praying with Pope Benedict XVI is the same for me. You know you are going to God and entering a mystery. He's looking Jesus in the eye and he wants you to have the same encounter. Tonight he looked at us as we held ashes out to be blessed. He was there to pray with us again tonight. Its tough to tell other people "Repent and believe in the Gospel" or "Remember you are dust, and to dust you shall return", when his look sows the words of his homily deep in your soul: "return to the Lord with your whole heart".
Nobody could say goodbye at the end. We don't want it to end with him, but we don't feel abandoned. One still gets the sense that we are going forward together. As we tried to express our love through the meager form of standing and clapping, he did us one better: "The Lord be with you!" And with your spirit dear Pope, and with your spirit! Coming down from the altar after Mass, he looked at us, his priests, one more time...and blessed us. He knows what is most important.
There's lots of hype out there, Benedict is teaching us to see whats most important. Avoid the hype.
Thank you Jesus for a chance to pray with him again.
Both of these are worth the time to read; worth the time to spend some time in silence reflecting on:
Full Text of Weds Audience and Pope's last homily on the same site
No comments:
Post a Comment