Live the new Beatitudes, Pope preaches at Mass in Sweden

November 02, 2016

On the final day of his two-day apostolic journey to Sweden, as Pope Francis celebrated the Mass of All Saints Day in Malmö, the nation’s third-largest city, he suggested a new set of Beatitudes for today’s Christians.

“We ought to be able to recognize and respond to new situtions with fresh spiritual energy,” the Pope said. He continued, adding to the list of eight beatitudes that Jesus gave in the Sermon on the Mount:

Blessed are those who remain faithful while enduring evils inflicted on them by others, and forgive them from their heart.

Blessed are those who look into the eyes of the abandoned and marginalized, and show them their closeness.

Blessed are those who see God in every person, and strive to make others also discover him.

Blessed are those who protect and care for our common home.

Blessed are those who renounce their own comfort in order to help others.

Blessed are those who pray and work for full communion between Christians.

All these are messengers of God’s mercy and tenderness, and surely they will receive from Him their merited reward.

Preaching in Spanish in Swedbank Stadium, an outdoor stadium that holds 24,000 people, the Pope said that holiness “is seen not so much in great deeds and extraordinary events, but rather in daily fidelity to the demands of our baptism.”

The Pope continued:

Yet if there is one thing typical of the saints, it is that they are genuinely happy. They found the secret of authentic happiness, which lies deep within the soul and has its source in the love of God. That is why we call the saints blessed. The Beatitudes are their path, their goal towards the homeland. The Beatitudes are the way of life that the Lord teaches us, so that we can follow in his footsteps.

“The call to holiness is directed to everyone and must be received from the Lord in a spirit of faith,” he added. “The saints spur us on by their lives and their intercession before God, and we ourselves need one another if we are to become saints. Helping one another to become saints! Together let us implore the grace to accept this call with joy and to join in bringing it to fulfillment.”

 

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Further information:

• Six new Beatitudes proposed by Pope Francis (CNS)
• Pope Francis Proposes 6 New Beatitudes to Confront Today’s Troubles (National Catholic Register)
• Pope’s Beatitudes Highlight Care for Environment and Outsiders (Wall Street Journal)