Monday, June 30, 2008

Pope Benedict: Paul is the " liturgist " to the Gentiles

I thought the end of Pope Benedict's homily yesterday for the Feast of Peter and Paul was quite striking. The homily can be located here on this page. This was picked up by The New Liturgical Review also at their post Papal Mass for Saints Peter and Paul - the Homily .
The Holy Father said:
This brings me back, finally, to St. Paul and his mission. He expressed the essence of his mission, as well as the most profound reason for his desire to go to Rome, in Chapter 15 of the Letter to the Romans, in an extraordinarily beautiful statement.

He knows he has been called "to be a minister [leitourgos] of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles in performing the priestly service of the gospel of God, so that the offering up of the Gentiles may be acceptable, sanctified by the holy Spirit" (15,16).

In this passage, Paul uses the word 'leiturgos' - liturgist and 'hierarchist' administering as priest. He means the cosmic liturgy, in which the world of men itself becomes an adoration of God, an oblation to the Holy Spirit. When all the world will have become a liturgy of God, when its reality will have become adoration, then it will have reached its goal, then it will be whole and saved. This is the ultimate objective of St. Paul's apostolic mission and of ours. Let us pray at this time that he may help us carry it out correctly in order that we may be true liturgists of Jesus Christ. Amen.

I think that is profound.

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