|
Message of the Holy Father for the First World
Day for Grandparents and the Elderly (25 July
2021), 22.06.2021
The following is the text of the message sent by
the Holy Father Francis for the First World Day
for Grandparents and the Elderly, to be held on
the fourth Sunday of July, this year on 25 July
– on the theme: “I am with you always” (Mt. 28:
20).
Message of the Holy Father
MESSAGE OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS
for the First World Day for Grandparents and the
Elderly
“I am with you always”
Dear Grandfathers and Grandmothers,
Dear Elderly Friends,
“I am with you always” (Mt 28:20): this is the
promise the Lord made to his disciples before he
ascended into heaven. They are the words that he
repeats to you today, dear grandfathers and
grandmothers, dear elderly friends. “I am with
you always” are also the words that I, as Bishop
of Rome and an elderly person like yourselves,
would like to address to you on this first World
Day of Grandparents and the Elderly. The whole
Church is close to you – to us – and cares about
you, loves you and does not want to leave you
alone!
I am well aware that this Message comes to you
at a difficult time: the pandemic swept down on
us like an unexpected and furious storm; it has
been a time of trial for everyone, but
especially for us elderly persons. Many of us
fell ill, others died or experienced the death
of spouses or loved ones, while others found
themselves isolated and alone for long periods.
The Lord is aware of all that we have been
through in this time. He is close to those who
felt isolated and alone, feelings that became
more acute during the pandemic. Tradition has it
that Saint Joachim, the grandfather of Jesus,
felt estranged from those around him because he
had no children; his life, like that of his wife
Anne, was considered useless. So the Lord sent
an angel to console him. While he mused sadly
outside the city gates, a messenger from the
Lord appeared to him and said, “Joachim,
Joachim! The Lord has heard your insistent
prayer”.[1] Giotto, in one of his celebrated
frescoes,[2] seems to set the scene at night,
one of those many sleepless nights, filled with
memories, worries and longings to which many of
us have come to be accustomed.
Even at the darkest moments, as in these months
of pandemic, the Lord continues to send angels
to console our loneliness and to remind us: “I
am with you always”. He says this to you, and he
says it to me. That is the meaning of this Day,
which I wanted to celebrate for the first time
in this particular year, as a long period of
isolation ends and social life slowly resumes.
May every grandfather, every grandmother, every
older person, especially those among us who are
most alone, receive the visit of an angel!
At times those angels will have the face of our
grandchildren, at others, the face of family
members, lifelong friends or those we have come
to know during these trying times, when we have
learned how important hugs and visits are for
each of us. How sad it makes me that in some
places these are still not possible!
The Lord, however, also sends us messengers
through his words, which are always at hand. Let
us try to read a page of the Gospel every day,
to pray with the psalms, to read the prophets!
We will be comforted by the Lord's faithfulness.
The Scriptures will also help us to understand
what the Lord is asking of our lives today. For
at every hour of the day (cf. Mt 20:1-16) and in
every season of life, he continues to send
labourers into his vineyard. I was called to
become the Bishop of Rome when I had reached, so
to speak, retirement age and thought I would not
be doing anything new. The Lord is always –
always – close to us. He is close to us with new
possibilities, new ideas, new consolations, but
always close to us. You know that the Lord is
eternal; he never, ever goes into retirement.
In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus tells the Apostles,
“Go therefore and make disciples of all nations,
baptizing them in the name of the Father and of
the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to
observe all that I have commanded you”
(28:19-20). These words are also addressed to us
today. They help us better understand that our
vocation is to preserve our roots, to pass on
the faith to the young, and to care for the
little ones. Think about it: what is our
vocation today, at our age? To preserve our
roots, to pass on the faith to the young and to
care for the little ones. Never forget this.
It makes no difference how old you are, whether
you still work or not, whether you are alone or
have a family, whether you became a grandmother
or grandfather at a young age or later, whether
you are still independent or need assistance.
Because there is no retirement age from the work
of proclaiming the Gospel and handing down
traditions to your grandchildren. You just need
to set out and undertake something new.
At this crucial moment in history, you have a
renewed vocation. You may wonder: How this can
be possible? My energy is running out and I
don’t think I can do much. How can I begin to
act differently when habit is so much a part of
my life? How can I devote myself to those who
are poor when I am already so concerned about my
family? How can I broaden my vision when I can’t
even leave the residence where I live? Isn’t my
solitude already a sufficiently heavy burden?
How many of you are asking just that question:
isn’t my solitude already a sufficiently heavy
burden? Jesus himself heard a similar question
from Nicodemus, who asked, “How can a man be
born when he is old?” (Jn 3:4). It can happen,
the Lord replies, if we open our hearts to the
working of the Holy Spirit, who blows where he
wills. The Holy Spirit whose freedom is such
that goes wherever, and does whatever, he wills.
As I have often observed, we will not emerge
from the present crisis as we were before, but
either better or worse. And “God willing… this
may prove not to be just another tragedy of
history from which we learned nothing… If only
we might keep in mind all those elderly persons
who died for lack of respirators... If only this
immense sorrow may not prove useless, but enable
us to take a step forward towards a new style of
life. If only we might discover once for all
that we need one another, and that in this way
our human frailty can experience a rebirth”
(Fratelli Tutti, 35). No one is saved alone. We
are all indebted to one another. We are all
brothers and sisters.
Given this, I want to tell you that you are
needed in order to help build, in fraternity and
social friendship, the world of tomorrow: the
world in which we, together with our children
and grandchildren, will live once the storm has
subsided. All of us must “take an active part in
renewing and supporting our troubled societies”
(ibid., 77). Among the pillars that support this
new edifice, there are three that you, better
than anyone else, can help to set up. Those
three pillars are dreams, memory and prayer. The
Lord’s closeness will grant to all, even the
frailest among us, the strength needed to embark
on a new journey along the path of dreams,
memory and prayer.
The prophet Joel once promised: “Your old men
shall dream dreams, and your young men will have
visions” (3:1). The future of the world depends
on this covenant between young and old. Who, if
not the young, can take the dreams of the
elderly and make them come true? Yet for this to
happen, it is necessary that we continue to
dream. Our dreams of justice, of peace, of
solidarity can make it possible for our young
people to have new visions; in this way,
together, we can build the future. You need to
show that it is possible to emerge renewed from
an experience of hardship. I am sure that you
have had more than one such experience: in your
life you have faced any number of troubles and
yet were able to pull through. Use those
experiences to learn how to pull through now.
Dreams are thus intertwined with memory. I think
of the painful memory of war, and its importance
for helping the young to learn the value of
peace. Those among you who experienced the
suffering of war must pass on this message.
Keeping memory alive is a true mission for every
elderly person: keeping memory alive and sharing
it with others. Edith Bruck, who survived the
horror of the Shoah, has said that “even
illuminating a single conscience is worth the
effort and pain of keeping alive the memory of
what has been.” She went on to say: “For me,
memory is life.”[3] I also think of my own
grandparents, and those among you who had to
emigrate and know how hard it is to leave
everything behind, as so many people continue to
do today, in hope of a future. Some of those
people may even now be at our side, caring for
us. These kinds of memory can help to build a
more humane and welcoming world. Without memory,
however, we will never be able to build; without
a foundation, we can never build a house. Never.
And the foundation of life is memory.
Finally, prayer. As my predecessor, Pope
Benedict, himself a saintly elderly person who
continues to pray and work for the Church, once
said: “the prayer of the elderly can protect the
world, helping it perhaps more effectively than
the frenetic activity of many others.”[4] He
spoke those words in 2012, towards the end of
his pontificate. There is something beautiful
here. Your prayer is a very precious resource: a
deep breath that the Church and the world
urgently need (cf. Evangelii Gaudium, 262).
Especially in these difficult times for our
human family, as we continue to sail in the same
boat across the stormy sea of the pandemic, your
intercession for the world and for the Church
has great value: it inspires in everyone the
serene trust that we will soon come to shore.
Dear grandmother, dear grandfather, dear elderly
friends, in concluding this Message to you, I
would also like to mention the example of
Blessed (and soon Saint) Charles de Foucauld. He
lived as a hermit in Algeria and there testified
to “his desire to feel himself a brother to all”
(Fratelli Tutti, 287). The story of his life
shows how it is possible, even in the solitude
of one’ s own desert, to intercede for the poor
of the whole world and to become, in truth, a
universal brother or sister.
I ask the Lord that, also through his example,
all of us may open our hearts in sensitivity to
the sufferings of the poor and intercede for
their needs. May each of us learn to repeat to
all, and especially to the young, the words of
consolation we have heard spoken to us today: “I
am with you always”! Keep moving forward! May
the Lord grant you his blessing.
Rome, Saint John Lateran, 31 May 2021, Feast of
the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary
FRANCIS
________________
[1] The episode is narrated in the
Protoevangelium of James.
[2] This image has been chosen as the logo for
the World Day of Grandparents and the Elderly.
[3] Memory is life, writing is breath.
L’Osservatore Romano, January 26, 2021.
[4] Visit to the Group Home “Viva gli Anziani”,
2 November 2012.
|