"Baptism is a new birthday," Pope Francis explains.The third session of catechesis on the vices and virtues, after the feast of the Baptism of the Lord, focused this Wednesday on gluttonyThe readers in the eight languages in the eight languages in which we operate. Readership in the eight languages in the Audience The participants were seven lay people from different countries, including men and women, and a Polish nun. "Tell me how you eat, and I will tell you what soul you possess," the Pope stressed.
In his first words, Francis looked to the Gospel, as he usually does, to focus on Jesus. "His first miracle, at the wedding feast at Cana, reveals his sympathy for human joys: he takes care that the feast ends well and gives the bride and groom a large quantity of good wine. Throughout his ministry, Jesus appears as a prophet very different from the Baptist: if John is remembered for his asceticism - he ate what he found in the desert - Jesus is, instead, the Messiah we often see at the table".
"His behavior arouses scandal, because he is not only benevolent towards sinners, but even eats with them; and this gesture demonstrated his willingness to commune with people whom everyone rejected."
Healthy joy at the wedding feast of Cana
Jesus taught us to be capable of loving "the wholesome joy of the wedding feast at Cana; to seat the poor and sinners at our table as a sign of communion; not to subject ourselves superstitiously to rules of impurity, but to consider everything as a gift from God, entrusted to our care," the Pope summarized in his meditation.
However, "more and more our society shows signs of having lost the authentic sense of the relationship with the goods of the earth. Many eating disorders express the suffering of so many people in the face of this reality. We have gone from being stewards of divine goods, to being consumers, holders of an insatiable voracity that is destroying the planet".
Eating disorders are spreading
Further on, the Pope developed some concepts. "The serene relationship that Jesus established with regard to food should be rediscovered and valued, especially in societies supposedly of well-being, where so many imbalances and pathologies manifest themselves. We eat too much, or too little. Eating is often done in solitude. Eating disorders are spreading: anorexia, bulimia, obesity... And medicine and psychology are trying to tackle the bad relationship with food".
These are illnesses, often very painful, "related above all to torments of the psyche and the soul. As Jesus taught, it is not the food itself that is bad, but the relationship we have with it".
"Food is the manifestation of something interior," the Pope continued. "The predisposition to balance or to immoderation; the ability to give thanks or the arrogant claim to autonomy; the empathy of those who know how to share food with those in need, or the selfishness of those who hoard it all for themselves. Tell me how you eat, and I will tell you what soul you possess".
Social gluttony, dangerous for the planet
The Pontiff's last reflection referred to the concept of predatory consumers of the planet.
"If we read it from a social point of view, gluttony is perhaps the most dangerous vice that is killing the planet. Because the sin of one who gives in to a piece of cake, after all, does not cause great harm, but the voracity with which we have been unleashed, for some centuries now, towards the goods of the planet, is compromising the future of all".
In the Pope's opinion, "we have rushed, above all, to make ourselves masters of everything, when everything had been consigned to our custody. This then is the great sin, the fury of the belly. We have abjured the name of men, to assume another, consumers".
We didn't even realize that someone had started calling us that, he has denounced. "We were made to be Eucharistic men and women, capable of giving thanks, discreet in our use of the earth, and instead we have become predators, and now we are realizing that this form of "gluttony" has done much harm to us and to the environment in which we live."
"Let us allow the Gospel to cure us of personal and social gluttony", he concluded, before praying the Pater noster and give the Blessing to the faithful in the Paul VI Hall.
Greetings to seminarians in Paris and other groups
In his cordial greetings to the pilgrim groups, the Pope expressly mentioned, first of all, the seminarians of the Paris seminary. At the beginning of December, the Holy Father wrote a letter, signed by the Secretary of State, Cardinal Pietro Parolin, to the seminarians of France. It was echoed by the January 2024 issue of Omnes magazinewhich delves into the celibacy with the collaboration of experienced authors.
In it, the Pope invites the seminarians of France, among other things, "to root well in your souls these fundamental truths that will be the basis of your life and of your very identity. And at the heart of this identity, configured to the Lord Jesus, is celibacy. The priest is celibate - and wants to be celibate - simply because Jesus was celibate".
Pilgrims from Korea, the United States, Poland...
In greeting the English-speaking pilgrims, The Pope paid special attention to the groups from Korea and the United States of America, and also greeted the priests of the Institute of Ongoing Theological Formation of the Pontifical North American College. I invoke upon all of you and upon your families the joy and peace of our Lord Jesus Christ," he said.
Later, addressing the Poles, he stressed that at the beginning of the new year, "it is important to remember that peace, so desired by all, is born in the heart of man. May Mary, Queen of Peace, sustain you so that your plans and decisions are born of the desire for good for yourselves, your families, your homeland and the whole world".
Ukrainian, Palestinian and Israeli peoples
At the end of the Audience, in Italian, the Holy Father's thoughts were addressed to the young, the sick, the elderly and the newlyweds: "I invite all of you to
to work always in the newness of life shown to us by the Son of God, who became incarnate to save man".
And as he always does with insistence, he once again prayed for peace, saying that he renews his prayerful closeness "to the beloved Ukrainian people so tried and to all those who suffer the horror of war in Palestine and Israel, as well as in other parts of the world".
