A snip from the Holy Father’s sermon for Epiphany:
Is there perhaps something of Herod also in us? Perhaps we also, sometimes, see God as a kind of rival? Perhaps we also are blind before His signs, deaf to His words, because we think the place limits on our life and don’t allow us to dispose of existence at our pleasure? Dear brothers and sisters, when we see God in this way, we end up feeling dissatisfied and discontent, because we don’t allow ourselves to be guide by Him who is at the foundation of all things. We must rid our minds and hearts the idea of rivalry, the idea that to give space to God is a limit on ourselves; we must open ourselves to the certainty that God is omnipotent love who takes nothing away, doesn’t threaten, on the contrary, is the One capable of giving us the possibility of living in fullness, to experience true joy.
This is an echo of the end of his sermon for his inaugural Mass in 2005.
“Are we not perhaps all afraid in some way? If we let Christ enter fully into our lives, if we open ourselves totally to him, are we not afraid that He might take something away from us? Are we not perhaps afraid to give up something significant, something unique, something that makes life so beautiful? Do we not then risk ending up diminished and deprived of our freedom? And once again the Pope said: No! If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful and great.”
