To the
faithful in St. Peter's Square
“I CAME THAT THEY MAY HAVE LIFE!”
10 May 1981
On
Sunday, 10 May, John Paul II delivered the following address to the large
numbers of faithful who crowded St. Peter’s Square to recite the “Regina Caeli”
with the Pope and bear witness to their commitment in defence of life from the
first moment of its conception in the mother’s womb. Mother Teresa of
1.”I came that they may have life,
and have it abundantly” (Jn
The Gospel of today, the fourth
Sunday of Easter, ends with these words. It is Christ
the Good Shepherd who speaks these words. It is Christ, who calls himself “the
door of the sheep” (Jn 10:7)
I wish to refer these words about
the abundance of life first of all to the gift of grace, which Christ brought
us by his Cross and Resurrection. I wish to refer them in the first place to
the Holy Spirit, “who is the Lord and gives life”, and we confess faith in him
with the words that, sixteen centuries ago, the First Council of Constantinople
set on the lips of the Church.
The Holy Spirit is the author of our
sanctification: he transforms man deep down, divinizes him, makes him a
participant in divine nature (cf. 2 Pt 1:4), just as fire makes metal
incandescent, just as spring water quenches thirst: “fons vivus, ignis,
caritas”. Grace is communicated by the Holy Spirit through the sacraments,
which accompany man during the whole span of his existence. By means of grace,
he becomes the sweet guest of the soul: “dulcis hospes animae”; he dwells in
our heart; he is the animator of secret energies, of courageous choices, of
unshakable faithfulness. He makes us live in abundance of life: divine life
itself.
Precisely through this solicitude
about the abundance of life Christ reveals
himself as the Good Shepherd of human souls: the Shepherd who foresees the
definitive future of man in God: the Shepherd who knows his sheep (cf. Jn
10:14) to the very depths of the inner truth of man, who can speak of himself
with the words of St. Augustine: “My heart is restless until it rests in Thee”
(cf. Conf. I, 1).
2.Dear
Brothers and Sisters!
Here you are, representatives of the
parishes and communities of the whole of Rome, gathered in St. Peter’s Square
today to bear witness that, in the course of these months and of the last few
weeks, you have thought of human life, first of all the life hidden under the
heart of the woman-mother, the life of unborn children. You have made this life
the object of your meditation, of your commitment as believers, as men, and as
citizens, but above all you have made it the object of your prayers. You have meditated on the special
responsibility towards conceived life, which, according to correct human
sentiment, must be surrounded by particular solicitude and protection, both on
the part of the parents themselves, and on the part of society, in particular
of the men who, in different ways, are responsible for this life.
3.By doing so, you have shown your solidarity with the invitation of
your bishops, who, during Lent, drew the attention of the whole of society
to the great threat that hovers over this fundamental value which human life
is, and in particular the life of unborn children. It is the task of the Church
to reaffirm that abortion is death, it is the killing
of an innocent creature. Consequently, the Church considers all legislation in
favour of abortion as a very serious offence against primary human rights and
the divine commandment “You shall not kill”.
4.All these efforts of yours, the
whole work of the Church, in Italy as in every other part of the world, which
aims at ensuring the sacred inviolability of conceived life, I wish to present
today to Christ, who said: “I came that they may have life”. In order that
these human beings, the smallest, the weakest and the most helpless, may have
life; in order that this life may never be taken from them before they are
born; this is precisely the purpose we serve and will serve, in union with the
Good Shepherd, because this is a holy cause.
5.Serving
this cause, we serve man and we serve society; we serve our country. Service
for man is manifested not only in the fact that we defend the life of an unborn
child. It is manifested at the same time in the fact that we defend human consciences. We defend the rectitude of human
conscience, so that it will call good good and evil evil, so that it will live
in truth. So that man will live in truth, so that society will live in truth.
When Christ says: “I came that they
may have life…”, he is also thinking, in fact he is
thinking especially, of that inner life
of man which is manifested in the voice of a correct conscience.
The Church has always considered her
service of conscience as being her essential service: the service rendered to
the consciences of all her sons and daughters – but also to the conscience of
every man. Since man lives a life worthy
of man when he follows the voice of a correct conscience – and when he does
not allow this conscience to be deafened in himself
and to become insensitive.
In this way men are served –
precisely the poorest and the neediest – by all those men and women in the
world who dedicate themselves to the defence of life, the life of bodies and of
souls: men and women missionaries, sisters, doctors, nurses, teachers,
technicians. Let it suffice to recall again for them all, as one well known to
us, Mother Teresa of Calcutta, whose voice in defence of the life of unborn
children is raised not only from India, but also from various parts of the
earth. In
Doing everything
to save man from material poverty, Mother Teresa – this admirable witness to
the dignity of mankind – does her utmost to defend his conscience too from
insensibility and spiritual death.
6.Dear
Brothers and Sisters!
Let us raise our hearts in prayer to
the Mother of the Redeemer, inviting her to paschal joy, as we do now in this
period. And at the same time let us pray to the holiest of all mothers for every mother on this earth and for every
unborn child in her womb.
Let us pray for the mothers whose
consciences are most threatened when they allow their child’s life to be taken…
Christ said: “When a woman is in travail she has sorrow, because her hour has
come; but when she is delivered of the child, she no longer remembers the
anguish, for joy that a child is born into the world” (Jn 16:21). Let us pray
for such joy in life even if it is offset by suffering and inner struggle. Let
us pray for the joy of consciences, “that they may have life, and have it
abundantly” (Jn