ASH WEDNESDAY MASS

We have gathered at the tomb of Peter, in this Vatican Patriarchal Basilica that contains the whole world, for the liturgy of the sacred Ashes that marks the beginning of Lent. As I address you, brothers and sisters, I feel joy and honour in presiding at this solemn liturgy on behalf of the Holy Father. We feel his spiritual presence among us and remember him with affection, asking the Lord to grant him the graces necessary for his primatial charism to strengthen the brethren in the unity of faith (cf. Lk 22: 32).

In the first reading, the Prophet Joel cries in the Lord's name, "Return to me with all your heart!" (Jl 2: 12). In the language of the Old Testament, the notion of conversion is vividly expressed by the verb "to re-turn", in other words, "to turn back".

From Sacred Scripture, we know that the People of Israel are continuously tempted to turn away from God and go the wrong way. Therefore, each time that they fall away, the Lord sends his prophets to say, "Turn back", that is, "turn round, go back to the right road, return to the Lord".
Indeed, it is not to an ideology that we must convert but rather, to the Lord. Our faith, in fact, is not an ideology but an attachment to Christ the Lord. The Lord himself says so:  "Return to me!". And a little later, the prophet explains the reason for this invitation:  "Return to the Lord, your God, for he is merciful, and on his part, all he does is to understand and forgive.

The message in the first reading goes further. The sound of trumpets reaches the ears of all the inhabitants - the elders, boys and girls, infants, married couples, priests -, because as a people they are called to the assembly and to the duty to convert.

Conversion is not an experience we can live alone:  according to the New Testament, it mainly originates in the liturgical gathering. Indeed, the moment of worship, as the Second Vatican Council reminds us, is the "source and summit" of Christian life (cf. Sacrosanctum Concilium, n. 10).

In the passage from Matthew, Jesus points out three ways to experience conversion:  almsgiving, that is, sharing; prayer, that is, entrusting oneself to the Lord; fasting, which implies the ability to control oneself. If, however, they are motivated by purely formal conventions, these forms of behaviour do not mean true conversion. "When you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing" (Mt 6: 3).

For fasting as for prayer, Jesus insists on the interior aspect. True prayer, together with the authentic conversion that derives from it, must flow from a heart that is determined to repent. Indeed, according to the Bible, the human being's destiny is staked on the heart.

Jesus does no more than encourage us to live this interiority both during moments of personal prayer and especially during liturgical prayer.

The Apostle Paul helps us to draw the conclusions that derive from listening to the Word of God. He exhorts the Christians of Corinth to be reconciled to God. Conversion, in fact, is reconciliation:  vertical reconciliation, with God, which is what all Christians must cultivate in their hearts first of all, and which must be matched by horizontal reconciliation, their reconciliation with their brothers and sisters.

If conversion derives eminently from the liturgical assembly, we must ask ourselves whether our lives are a sincere synthesis of the three moments:  liturgy, conversion and reconciliation.

The office of Major Penitentiary enables me to experience every day the beauty of the Sacrament of Penance, a gift of grace, a gift of life; Christ's loving compassion for humanity is renewed in it, and at the same time grace and heartfelt joy are restored, the nuptial garment that permits access to eternal life.

Brothers and sisters, at the dawn of this third millennium, the Church alone as the Body of Christ can settle in the inmost depths of the person and in the human community the tensions that the world is living today at all levels. We too in the Roman Curia, and it could not be otherwise, are daily experiencing our limits and our frailty.

The Holy Father has frequently reminded us (cf. Apostolic Constitution Pastor Bonus) of our duty to offer the Church and the world a lofty example of reciprocal harmony and peace in its noblest sense, since this originates in Jesus Christ. In fact, according to the Letter to the Ephesians (cf. 2: 14), he is our peace.

I am convinced that the first of the solemn documents is the book of our life, which must bear witness to the world that reconciliation, that is, peace, is possible. And there will be no peace without the indispensable attention to the poor, the responsibility for whom, amid today's ecological disaster, lies largely with our consumer society.

The Word of God is addressed to my confreres and to all who work at the service of the Apostolic See, so that with every means and in a state of permanent conversion we can set the example of an austere Christian life; and so that our view may be uncluttered in order to serve God alone, ever seeking the good of our brothers and sisters.

We must answer with the convincing witness of our lives the question that the contemporary world is more and more frequently asking:  "Where is our God?". Indeed, God's presence and compassion do not rain down from on high. The active presence of God in the women and men of today passes through us, especially when we gather "as Church" round the table of the Word and the Bread of Life.

Lent this year, according to the Holy Father's invitation, highlights our essential relationship with the Eucharist. "Without the memorial of the Lord - that is, without the Eucharist - we cannot exist", the Christians of North Africa declared during the persecution of Diocletian. Nor can we live without the strength that comes from the Eucharist, especially on Sundays.

I would like to sum up our Lenten commitment in three points: 

1. The liturgy of the Church, in the face of the widespread uncertainty of faith, is the first means of genuine evangelization, inspired by the image of the disciples of Emmaus who, based on the Word of the Lord explained along the way, recognized him in the breaking of the bread (cf. Lk 24).

2. On Sundays, let us rediscover the Eucharist! Let us make our own this "Eucharistic amazement" that guided the Holy Father in drafting the Encyclical Letter Ecclesia de Eucharistia (cf. nn. 5-6). But let us be concerned with rediscovering its dimension as a banquet and its inalienable sacrificial dimension, since "the Eucharist is too great a gift to tolerate ambiguity and depreciation" (n. 10).

3. With the Eucharist, let us rediscover the relationship between liturgy and life, as it was outlined by the Holy Father in his Apostolic Letter Mane Nobiscum Domine:  attention to poverty in all its forms, together with mutual love, will make us recognize one another as true disciples of Christ.
This is the criterion on the basis of which the authenticity of our Eucharistic celebrations will be tested (cf. n. 28). In turn, this relationship between liturgy and life demands a determined witness to the true values:  life, the family, personal honesty, the commitments that derive from the bond of marriage, from priestly celibacy, from religious consecration and from the profession one exercises in society, without which true poverty of spirit would not exist.

Let us ask God the Father to help us rediscover and make our own the mystique of service at the school of Jesus, whom the Prophets prefigured as the Servant of the Lord (cf. Is 52: 13ff.), and at the school of the Virgin Mother who, in declaring herself the handmaid of the Lord (cf. Lk 1: 38), prepared the ground for the great plan of the Redemption. Amen.

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