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HOMILY OF THE SUBSTITUTE FOR GENERAL AFFAIRS
OF THE SECRETARIAT OF STATE
DURING THE MASS IN THE BASILICA OF SUYAPA
Tegucigalpa (Honduras)
Saturday, 13
July 2024
Dear brothers in the episcopate,
Dear Apostolic Nuncio,
Dear Msgr. Giacomo, secretary of the Apostolic Nunciature in
Honduras,
Dear priests, deacons, seminarians, men and women religious,
Distinguished civil authorities and members of the Diplomatic Corps,
Brothers and sisters all in the Lord,
Today, full of gratitude, I return to this house, which was my
home, with a task that fills my heart with joy: to convey the warm
greeting that His Holiness Pope Francis addresses to you as Father
and Pastor. Last Tuesday, when I stopped by to greet him and I
informed him of this visit, he strongly requested that I convey to
the Honduran people his affection and constant remembrance in
prayer, and ask you all, please, to pray for him before Our Lady of
Suyapa.
After the four years of my service in the Apostolic Nunciature,
the last time I had the opportunity to come as a pilgrim to the
beautiful Basilica of Our Lady of Suyapa was in the year 2011. Ever
since the first time, I felt welcomed by the maternal presence of
Our Lady in this, her home, and also embraced by your affection,
dear Honduran brothers and sisters, who since the very beginning
have made me feel at home. Now, after more than a decade, full of
emotion, moved and grateful, I return to this country that I
consider my home and, in particular, this sacred place, to entrust
to the loving intercession of Saint Mary, Mother of God, the Church,
the Holy Father and his minister as universal pastor, as well as
myself and the beloved Honduran people.
As we have just heard in the Gospel, after the annunciation of
the Angel, “Mary arose and went with haste” (Lk 1:39); she
does not stay still, paralyzed or dumbfounded by the meaning of the
message she has received, but immediately sets out on a journey.
Mary’s journey is also the journey of the Church. Mary, just like
the Church, without ceasing her journey, knows how to pause.
Therefore this Shrine of Suyapa – which occupies a special place in
the heart of all the wonderful people of this country – like all the
Marian shrines scattered throughout the world – is like an
intermediate stop on the way, a curve in the path of life, where
Mary awaits us all to comfort our weary and aching hearts, and to
alleviate the sufferings that are never lacking in the harsh journey
of existence.
In His infinite love, God provided that every Marian shrine be a
corner where the Virgin, attentive and watchful, welcomes her
children and reminds them that she continues to accompany them on
their pilgrimage toward the heavenly homeland. Therefore, Mary’s
journey is also the journey of the Church. Mary is the mother who
walks with the Church, who is in turn a mother, our mother. For this
reason, all of us, Pastors and faithful, sons and daughters of the
Church, are in this shrine of Suyapa to venerate and honour Mary,
our Mother and Mother of God, patroness and protectress of the
beloved Honduran people; and we beg her to show us the way, which is
her Son Jesus Christ, praying to her with the beautiful and ancient
invocation “iter para tutum”, that she might protect our
journey, make it safe and help us not to go astray on paths of
darkness and shadows of death.
Mary, through the mystery of the Annunciation and the Visitation,
is the example that we are all invited to follow. She, who first
welcomed Jesus into her existence and then shared everything she had
received, is the model of every believer. Every time we receive
Jesus in Holy Communion, He is embodied in our life and urges us to
welcome Him and to honour Him in the flesh of the poorest and most
abandoned.
Dear brothers and sisters, in this time, sadly marked by the
horror of war, by the mistreatment of our common home, by the
scandalous and arrogant poverty that afflicts so many of our
neighbours, let us implore the intercession of Our Lady of Suyapa so
that, like her, we too may welcome in our heart He who is the Word,
and bear witness to the entire world that only Jesus Christ is the
living centre that can give meaning to life, and the wellspring to
sustain true brotherhood founded on justice, peace and
reconciliation.
Today, having reached the end of my visit to the beloved Honduran
people, I wish to reiterate to you the Holy Father’s best wishes,
and to encourage you untiringly to implore the Patroness of
Honduras, so that she may protect the Church, the Pope, this nation
and the entire world. And so that, with loving maternal solicitude,
she may continue to care for and protect the mission God has
entrusted to each one of us, and that we may strive to be witnesses
of the Father’s merciful love – the source from which joy is always
born and reborn -, builders of fraternity and the Lord’s co-workers
in the edification of a civilization founded on love. So be it.
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Holy See Press Office Bulletin, 14 July 2024 |