The Holy Father had his Sunday Angleus today at the Papal Estate Castel Gandolfo. He talks World Youth Day and this weeks G-8 meeting. Thanks for the Ratzinger Forum for the pics from today's Angelus as well as the quick translation. Be sure to check out Blog by the Sea that has the news reports on today's Angelus and will no doubt update Vatican and news wire translations of the full text at her entry Benedict XVI Looks to World Youth Day
Dear brothers and sisters,
I wish first of all to address an affectionate and grateful greeting to the authorities and the entire civilian and ecclesial community of Castel Gandolfo, who always have a cordial and attentive welcome for me during my stay here.
My thoughts go next to Australia, where, God willing, I will be headed for next Saturday, July 12, where the XXIII World Youth Day will take place in Sydney, at the southeastern part of that country. In the past several months, the 'Cross of the Youth' has travelled through all of Oceania, and in Sydney, it will once more be a silent witness to the pact of alliance between the Lord Jesus and the new generations.
The welcome celebrations for the WYD participants will take place on July 15, with the great vigil on Saturday, July 19, and the final Eucharistic celebration on Sunday, July 20, as the culmination and conclusion of the event. The Australian bishops conference has prepared everything carefully, with the valuable collaboration of civilian authorities. The first groups of young people are now leaving from other continents on their way to Australia. I invite the whole Church to feel themselves participants in this new stage of the great youth pilgrimage across the world, started in 1985 by the Servant of God John Paul II.
The next World Youth Day presents itself as a renewed Pentecost. In effect, the Christian communities have been preparing for a year along the lines that I indicated in the message on the theme "You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, and you will be my witnesses" (Acts 1,8). It is the promise Jesus made to his disciples after the Resurrection, and it remains always valid and actual in the Church.
The Holy Spirit, awaited and welcomed in prayer, infuses into believers the capacity to be witnesses of Jesus and his Gospel. Breathing on the sails of the Church, the divine Spirit pushes us 'out to sea' ever anew, from generation to generation, to bring to all the good news of God's love, fully revealed in Jesus Christ, who died and was resurrected for us. I am sure that from every corner of the earth, Catholics will join me and the assembled youth in Sydney, as in a Cenacle, intensely invoking the Holy Spirit so that he may flood hearts with interior light, with love for God and our brothers, with courageous initiatives for introducing the eternal message of Jesus in a variety of languages and cultures.
An icon of the Virgin Mary also accompanies the World Youth Days along with the Cross. Let us entrust to her maternal protection this trip to Australia and the meeting with the young people in Sydney. Besides, on this first Sunday of July, I wish to invoke the intercession of Mary so that the summer season may offer to everyone the occasion for rest as well as physical and spiritual recharging.
After the Angelus prayers, he said this:
Tomorrow, July 7, the heads of state and government of the member countries of G8, and other world leaders, will meet in Japan for their annual summit. In these days, many voices - among them, the presidents of the bishops conferences in those nations - have been raised to ask that the G8 carry out the commitments they have made in previous G8 meetings and courageously adopt all the necessary measures to conquer the scourges of extreme poverty, hunger, sickness and illiteracy, which continue to afflict so many parts of the world.
I join this urgent appeal for solidarity. Therefore, I address myself to the participants of the meeting in Hokkaido-Toyako, so that they may focus their deliberations on the needs of the weakest and poorest populations, whose vulnerability has grown today because of financial speculations and turbulences and their perverse effects on the costs of food and energy. I hope that generosity and farsightedness may help them to take decisions that will relaunch an equitable process of integral development that will safeguard human dignity.
I greet the children and their chaperons who are participating in the 2008 International Festival of Child Artists organized by the Soong Ching Ling Foundation of Italy. Love, concord, harmony and solidarity are the values which you wish to promote in China and other countries of the world. Art and culture can unite peoples. Children represent the future of the human family and are, therefore, called rightfully to build a more beautiful and more humane world. Your presence allows me to send a wish of peace and joy to all your contemporaries in China and in the whole world.
Once again, my greeting to you all!
Later, in English, he said:
I am happy to welcome all the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors present at this Angelus. During these months many will be taking their annual holiday. Let us pray that all who are travelling on the roads will do so in safety, with prudence and respect for others. In this way our summer break will truly be a time for relaxation, family life and friendship. In today’s Gospel we are reminded by Jesus that children welcome the Kingdom of Heaven. Let us purify our hearts so that, like them, we may receive in simplicity the will of God and follow generously day by day the path marked out for us. I wish you all a pleasant stay in Castel Gandolfo and Rome, and a blessed Sunday!
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