"The Lord is calling me to "climb the
mountain", to devote myself even more to prayer and meditation. But this
does not mean abandoning the Church, indeed, if God is asking me to do
this, it is so I can continue to serve the Church with the same
dedication and the same love with which I have done thus far, but in a
way that is better suited to my age and my strength". The last Angelus of Benedict XVI.
Banners and signs held aloft by pilgrims read in different languages "We are with you" and "Thank you".
Flags from all over the world are unfurled.
"Thank you for your affection," are the first words a smiling Benedict XVI addresses the huge crowd that filled St. Peter's Square, spilling over onto Vial della Conciliazione. There are perhaps 200 thousand people present. "Thank you," he continues, when the crowd interrupts him with applause.
Like every Sunday, the Pope said the Gospel of the day, an episode which, he says, "I feel particularly directed at me, at this point in my life." The liturgy presents the Transfiguration and "the evangelist Luke places particular emphasis on the fact that Jesus was transfigured as he prayed: his is a profound experience of relationship with the Father during a sort of spiritual retreat that Jesus lives on a high mountain in the company of Peter, James and John , the three disciples always present in moments of divine manifestation of the Master (Luke 5:10, 8.51, 9.28).
The Lord, who shortly before had foretold his death and resurrection (9:22), offers his disciples a foretaste of his glory. And even in the Transfiguration, as in baptism, we hear the voice of the Heavenly Father, "This is my Son, the Chosen One listen to him" (9:35). The presence of Moses and Elijah, representing the Law and the Prophets of the Old Covenant, it is highly significant: the whole history of the Alliance is focused on Him, the Christ, who accomplishes a new "exodus" (9:31) , not to the promised land as in the time of Moses, but to Heaven. Peter's words: "Master, it is good that we are here" (9.33) represents the impossible attempt to stop this mystical experience. St. Augustine says: "[Peter] ... on the mountain ... had Christ as the food of the soul. Why should he come down to return to the labours and pains, while up there he was full of feelings of holy love for God that inspired in him a holy conduct? "(Sermon 78.3).
" We can draw a very important lesson from meditating on this passage of the Gospel. First, the primacy of prayer, without which all the work of the apostolate and of charity is reduced to activism. In Lent we learn to give proper time to prayer, both personal and communal, which gives breath to our spiritual life. In addition, to pray is not to isolate oneself from the world and its contradictions, as Peter wanted on Tabor, instead prayer leads us back to the path, to action. "The Christian life - I wrote in my Message for Lent - consists in continuously scaling the mountain to meet God and then coming back down, bearing the love and strength drawn from him, so as to serve our brothers and sisters with God's own love "(n. 3)".
"Dear brothers and sisters, I feel that this Word of God is particularly directed at me, at this point in my life. The Lord is calling me to "climb the mountain", to devote myself even more to prayer and meditation. But this does not mean abandoning the Church, indeed, if God is asking me to do this it is so that I can continue to serve the Church with the same dedication and the same love with which I have done thus far, but in a way that is better suited to my age and my strength. Let us invoke the intercession of the Virgin Mary: may she always help us all to follow the Lord Jesus in prayer and works of charity".
"I thank everyone for the many expressions of gratitude, affection and closeness in prayer which I have received in these days", his words, at the end, in Italian. "Thank you, we will always be close in prayer," he adds. The crowd appalude and does not seem to want to leave.