Let us strive to offer the prayer and penance that the Holy Father has asked from everyone in his recent “Letter to the People of God.” And let us love the Church and the Pope with an ever greater love. It will be helpful for us to remember that the Church is not simply an assembly of men and women that we have joined. Rather, and above all, as Saint Josemaria taught, the Church is “Christ present in our midst, God coming towards mankind in order to save us, calling us with his revelation, sanctifying us with his grace, maintaining us with his constant help, in the great and small battles of our daily life” (Christ is Passing By, no. 131).
We are drawing close to the 90th anniversary of the day on which God let Saint Josemaria see the Work. To prepare ourselves, let us try to rediscover, with new depth and desires of conversion, the strength of the personal call that God is addressing to us.
I ask you to pray for the new priests who will receive ordination tomorrow, and for the Synod that will take place in October.
Torreciudad, 1 September 2018