The Pope remind his congregation that “eternal life” designates The salvific significance of the cross <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Pope celebrated Mass for the bishops and cardinals who died in the past year on Wednesday. In his homily he addressed what I believe –and the Church has consistently taught– are central themes of our Catholic faith which are too often misunderstood or not understood enough. The last line of this post is THE … Continue reading The cross reveals God’s face of love giving us a sure hope of eternal life<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1757,2033,1892,2557,1803],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25917"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=25917"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25917\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
<\/span><\/p>\n![\"Thumbnail](\"https:\/\/communio.stblogs.org\/assets_c\/2010\/11\/Salvador-Dali-Christ-thumb-225x387-7547.jpg\")
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\n“the divine gift granted to humankind; i.e., communion with God in this
\nworld and its fullness in the next<\/b>. Eternal life was opened to us by Christ’s
\nPaschal Mystery and faith is the way to attain it”. Referring then to
\nJesus’ conversation with Nicodemus, as recounted in today’s Gospel, the Pope
\nexplained how in this exchange Jesus “reveals the most profound meaning of
\nthe event of salvation: … The Son of man must be raised on the wood of the
\ncross so that those who believe in Him might have life. … The cross,
\nparadoxically<\/u>, from<\/b> being a sign of condemnation, death and failure, becomes<\/b> a
\nsign of redemption, life and victory in which, with the eyes of faith, we can
\nsee the fruits of salvation.”<\/span><\/p>\n
\n“consists in the immense love of God<\/u> and in the gift of His only-begotten
\nSon. … The verbs ‘to love’ and ‘to give’ indicate a decisive and definitive
\naction expressing the radical way in which God approached man in love<\/u>, even
\nunto the total giving of self, … lowering Himself into the abyss of our utter
\nabandonment, and crossing the portal of death<\/b>. The object and beneficiary of
\ndivine Love is the world, in other words humanity<\/i><\/b><\/u>. This completely cancels the
\nidea of a distant God divorced from man’s journey, and reveals His true
\nface.” God “loves without measure. He does not show His omnipotence
\nin punishment, but in mercy and forgiveness<\/b>.”