Pope Francis celebrates the rooster mass with the “heart” in Bethlehem

He Pope Francisco celebrated this Sunday the traditional midnight mass in St. Peter’s Basilica with the “heart” in Bethlehem, where, he said, “the Prince of Peace continues to be rejected by the losing logic of war, with the roar of weapons.”

“And our heart tonight is in Bethlehem, where the Prince of Peace continues to be rejected by the losing logic of war, with the roar of weapons that also today prevent him from finding a rest in the world,” the pope told the beginning of his homily, thus remembering the war in Gaza.

The pope dedicated the rest of the homily to the moment of Jesus’ birth when “a census of the entire earth” was being carried out, which, for Francis, “manifests, on the one hand, the all-too-human plot that runs through history: that of a world that seeks power and strength, fame and glory, where everything is measured with successes and results, with figures and numbers.”

“It is the obsession with profit,” the pope said before the 6,500 people who packed the basilica, while thousands of others were in the square following the mass on screens.

Francisco assured that “there is the risk of living Christmas with a pagan idea of ​​God, as if he were a powerful master who is in heaven; a god who allies himself with power, with worldly success and with the idolatry of consumerism.”

Francis criticized, as he did during the morning Angelus prayer, the idea of ​​a Christmas party that has fallen only into consumerism. The traditional rooster mass was celebrated as in previous years at 7:30 p.m. (6:30 p.m. GMT) and Francisco, due to his knee problems, remained seated on one side of the altar, from where he read his homily.

For this reason, it was a deacon who uncovered the image of the Child at the foot of Bernini’s canopy and incensed it, while children from various parts of the world placed flowers next to it and in St. Peter’s Square the bells rang to announce the birth. of Jesus.

Also during the homily, the pontiff rejected “the false image of a distant and irritable god, who behaves well with the good and gets angry with the bad; of a god made in our image, useful only to solve our problems and take away our evils.”

”He, on the other hand, does not use the magic wand, he is not the commercial god at all and right now. He does not save us by pressing a button, but rather he approaches to change reality from within,” he noted.

And he regretted that among Catholics “the worldly idea of ​​a distant and controlling god, rigid and powerful, who helps his own to impose themselves on others” is rooted.

You are not a number

He stated that for God, “who has changed history during the census, you are not a number, but a face; Your name is written in his heart.”

”But you, looking at your heart, at your performance that is not enough, at the world that judges and does not forgive, perhaps you are living badly this Christmas, thinking that you are not up to the task, harboring a feeling of failure and dissatisfaction with your fragilities. , for your falls and your problems. But today, please leave the initiative to Jesus, who tells you: For you I became flesh, for you I became like you,” he noted.

And he added: “Tonight love changes history. Make us believe, oh Lord, in the power of your love, so different from the power of the world.” Tomorrow Jorge Bergoglio will once again appear on the balcony of the central loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican, just as when he was elected pope in 2013, to read his Christmas message and impart the traditional blessing “Urbi et Orbi” (to the city and the world).