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Pope: it's wrong to think our enemies must go to hell
cna ^ | June 20, 2013

Posted on 06/20/2013 2:39:32 PM PDT by NYer

Pope Francis leads the Bishops of Italy in a solemn Profession of Faith in St. Peter's Basilica for their 65th General Assembly May 23, 2013. Credit: Stephen Drsicoll/CNA.

Vatican City, Jun 20, 2013 / 01:00 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis stressed that it's false to think our enemies “must go to hell” during his daily Mass at the Vatican's Saint Martha House June 20.

“You cannot pray with enemies in your heart,” he said June 20. “With (both) brothers and enemies in your heart, you cannot pray.”

“They must go to hell, right? I will have nothing to do with them!” the Bishop of Rome said sarcastically.

The Pope told how Jesus noted, “if we do not forgive others, neither will the Father forgive us our sins.”

“It’s so hard to forgive others, it is really difficult because we always have that regret inside,” he said.

“We think ‘you did this to me, you wait … I’ll repay him the favor.'”

Pope Francis gave his homily based on the day’s Gospel, which tells how Jesus taught his disciples to pray the ‘Our Father.”

“We have a father very close to us, who embraces us,” the Roman pontiff said.

“All these worries, concerns that we have, let's leave them to the Father; he knows what we need.”

“But Father, what? My father?”

“No, our Father!” he exclaimed. “Because I am not an only child, none of us are, and if I cannot be a brother, I can hardly become a child of the Father, because he is a father to all.”

Pope Francis underscored that if we are not “at peace with my brothers, I cannot say ‘Father’ to him.”  

Saying “Father, I have sinned” is “the key of every prayer, to feel loved by a father,” he reflected.

“Jesus immediately gives us a piece of advice in prayer: ‘in praying, do not babble,’ do not make worldly noises, vain noises.”

Pope Francis explained that Jesus teaches us not to turn to God with “so many words” because “he knows everything.”

“And he warned that prayer is not a magical thing – there is no magic with prayer.”

The Bishop of Rome noted “someone once told me that when he went to a witch doctor they said a lot of words to heal him, but that is pagan.”

“You must pray to him who generated you, who gave you life,” Pope Francis said.

“Not to everyone – everyone is too anonymous.”

“To whom do I pray, to a cosmic God?” he asked.

Praying to a 'cosmic God' is a polytheistic model that comes from “a rather light culture,” and is too impersonal.

“To whom do I pray, to the almighty God? He is too far off, ah, I can’t hear him. Neither did Jesus.”

“You must pray to the Father,” Pope Francis affirmed.

“The first” word is Father and it is “the key” to prayer.

He stressed that “without saying, without feeling that word, you cannot pray.”

“Jesus has promised us the Holy Spirit, it is he who teaches us from within, from the heart, how to say ‘Father’ and how to say ‘our.'”


TOPICS: Apologetics; Catholic; Prayer
KEYWORDS: abba; catholic; francis; lordsprayer; ourfather; pope; prayer; romancatholicism
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1 posted on 06/20/2013 2:39:32 PM PDT by NYer
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To: netmilsmom; thefrankbaum; Tax-chick; GregB; saradippity; Berlin_Freeper; Litany; SumProVita; ...

Ping!


2 posted on 06/20/2013 2:39:49 PM PDT by NYer ( "Run from places of sin as from the plague."--St John Climacus)
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To: NYer

So is it still wrong for me to wish they would? Do I have to go to confession for that?


3 posted on 06/20/2013 2:41:42 PM PDT by Mastador1 (I'll take a bad dog over a good politician any day!)
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To: NYer

Hmm. Is he going to argue that there’s a chance that Osama bin Laden ended up anywhere else?


4 posted on 06/20/2013 2:41:43 PM PDT by MeganC (A gun is like a parachute. If you need one, and don't have one, you'll never need one again.)
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To: Mastador1

I wish people would get their earthly punishments, but now that we no longer have a justice system, they don’t.

But as for eternity, who knows? Maybe they repented at the last moment, maybe from eternity they will do some good in penance. That’s why Catholics always prayed for the souls in Purgatory, because people who were neither damned nor on the fast track to Heaven were always considered to be powerful and able to help us here because they were trying to work out their own repentance.


5 posted on 06/20/2013 2:49:31 PM PDT by livius
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To: NYer
America's leading enemy doesn't want to go to hell - too lazy - he expects to bring hell right here to our country.


6 posted on 06/20/2013 2:57:56 PM PDT by Pollster1 ("Shall not be infringed" is unambiguous.)
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To: Mastador1; livius
So is it still wrong for me to wish they would? Do I have to go to confession for that?

Here is your escort to the confessional ...


"Young man, have you forgotten the 2nd greatest commandment? Love your neighbor as yourself"

7 posted on 06/20/2013 3:17:23 PM PDT by NYer ( "Run from places of sin as from the plague."--St John Climacus)
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To: NYer

The Vatican has enemies? That’s different.


8 posted on 06/20/2013 3:18:10 PM PDT by kempster
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To: MeganC

Hmm. Is he going to argue that there’s a chance that Osama bin Laden ended up anywhere else?
_______

Whether or not that chance exists is a matter between bin Laden and God.


9 posted on 06/20/2013 3:20:25 PM PDT by pax_et_bonum (Never Forget the Seals of Extortion 17 - and God Bless America)
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To: NYer; Mastador1; livius

Lol!


10 posted on 06/20/2013 3:21:50 PM PDT by pax_et_bonum (Never Forget the Seals of Extortion 17 - and God Bless America)
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To: NYer

Hate is someone letting their dog shit in your driveway and then pushing your nose in it. You HATE them for it!

The same applies for someone who takes your freedoms and lifetime savings along with making you live in the Bizzarro world of illegal aliens, criminals, queers and child molesters and others who have become a protected species in the name of Political Correctness.

Yes.............hate is real and wishing damnation on those who have done you wrong is appropriate.

What a fool!


11 posted on 06/20/2013 3:22:33 PM PDT by DH (Once the tainted finger of government touches anything the rot begins)
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To: NYer

Here is my interpretation of this sermon:

Perhaps this is part of his message:
Subtle undertones about different cultures around the world where the people profess to be “Catholic” or “Christian” yet they maintain pagan rituals that may include “cursing” others. (Cursing can mean wishing physical harm or eternal damnation.)

Remember the Pope’s background and his upbringing and how this may have shaped his worldview beyond the walls of the Vatican.


12 posted on 06/20/2013 3:22:59 PM PDT by ruralvoter
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To: DH
What a fool!

I take it you are not a christian. (Matt. 22:17-21

13 posted on 06/20/2013 3:31:38 PM PDT by NYer ( "Run from places of sin as from the plague."--St John Climacus)
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To: NYer

Yep, I had her in second grade, Sister Mary Rapanuckle. And of course there was Monsignor Ripyourearoff!


14 posted on 06/20/2013 3:38:17 PM PDT by Mastador1 (I'll take a bad dog over a good politician any day!)
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To: NYer

He is 100% correct. From now on, I’ll wish them to go to Detroit, or maybe New Jersey.


15 posted on 06/20/2013 3:41:29 PM PDT by TexasPaul (TexasPaul)
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To: pax_et_bonum

“Whether or not that chance exists is a matter between bin Laden and God.”


God pretty well ruled that out. Bin Laden is in hell.

Joh_14:6 Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.


16 posted on 06/20/2013 3:57:08 PM PDT by Greetings_Puny_Humans
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To: Greetings_Puny_Humans

Okay.

So you know what is held between another person and God at the moment of that person’s death.

I don’t.


17 posted on 06/20/2013 4:28:30 PM PDT by pax_et_bonum (Never Forget the Seals of Extortion 17 - and God Bless America)
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To: pax_et_bonum

“So you know what is held between another person and God at the moment of that person’s death.

I don’t.”


I imagine it was the bullet passing through his brain right then.


18 posted on 06/20/2013 4:43:45 PM PDT by Greetings_Puny_Humans
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To: NYer

I’m sure that for most people it is wrong to think your enemies are going to hell. However, it is a certain that MY enemies are, in fact, Hell bound. That is just the way it is.


19 posted on 06/20/2013 4:44:05 PM PDT by AEMILIUS PAULUS (It is a shame that when these people give a riot)
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To: Greetings_Puny_Humans

You’re just itchin’ for a fight, aren’t you?

:-)

Ain’t bitin’.


20 posted on 06/20/2013 4:46:37 PM PDT by pax_et_bonum (Never Forget the Seals of Extortion 17 - and God Bless America)
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