THE HOMILY GIVEN BY
CARDINAL JOSEPH RATZINGER AT
POPE JOHN PAUL II's FUNERAL MASS

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The Vatican Information Service released the homily, delivered in
Italian by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, at the funeral Mass for Pope John Paul II,
held in St Peter's Square on the morning of 2005-APR-08.

"'Follow me.' The Risen Lord says these words to Peter. They are his
last words to this disciple, chosen to shepherd his flock. 'Follow me' -
this lapidary saying of Christ can be taken as the key to understanding the
message which comes to us from the life of our late beloved Pope John Paul II.
Today we bury his remains in the earth as a seed of immortality - our hearts are
full of sadness, yet at the same time of joyful hope and profound gratitude.
"These are the sentiments that inspire us, Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
present here in Saint Peter's Square, in neighboring streets and in various
other locations within the city of Rome, where an immense crowd, silently
praying, has gathered over the last few days. I greet all of you from my heart.
In the name of the College of Cardinals, I also wish to express my respects to
Heads of State, Heads of Government and the delegations from various countries.
I greet the Authorities and official representatives of other Churches and
Christian Communities, and likewise those of different religions. Next I greet
the Archbishops, Bishops, priests, religious men and women and the faithful who
have come here from every Continent; especially the young, whom John Paul II
liked to call the future and the hope of the Church. My greeting is extended,
moreover, to all those throughout the world who are united with us through radio
and television in this solemn celebration of our beloved Holy Father's funeral.
"Follow me! As a young student Karol Wojtyla was thrilled by literature, the
theatre, and poetry. Working in a chemical plant, surrounded and threatened by
the Nazi terror, he heard the voice of the Lord: Follow me! In this
extraordinary setting he began to read books of philosophy and theology, and
then entered the clandestine seminary established by Cardinal Sapieha. After the
war he was able to complete his studies in the faculty of theology of the
Jagiellonian University of Krakow. How often, in his letters to priests and in
his autobiographical books has he spoken to us about his priesthood, to which he
was ordained on 1 November 1946. In these texts he interprets his priesthood
with particular reference to three sayings of the Lord. First: 'You did not
choose me, but I chose you. And I appointed you to go and bear fruit, fruit that
will last' (Jn 15:16). The second saying is: 'The good shepherd lays down
his life for the sheep' (Jn 10:11). And then: 'As the Father has loved
me, so I have loved you; abide in my love' (Jn 15:9). In these three sayings
we see the heart and soul of our Holy Father. He really went everywhere,
untiringly, in order to bear fruit, fruit that lasts. 'Rise, Let us be on our
Way!' is the title of his next-to-last book. 'Rise, let us be on our way!'
- with these words he roused us from a lethargic faith, from the sleep of the
disciples of both yesterday and today. 'Rise, let us be on our way!' he
continues to say to us even today. The Holy Father was a priest to the last, for
he offered his life to God for his flock and for the entire human family, in a
daily self-oblation for the service of the Church, especially amid the
sufferings of his final months. And in this way he became one with Christ, the
Good Shepherd who loves his sheep. Finally, 'abide in my love:' the Pope
who tried to meet everyone, who had an ability to forgive and to open his heart
to all, tells us once again today, with these words of the Lord, that by abiding
in the love of Christ we learn, at the school of Christ, the art of true love.
"Follow me! In July 1958 the young priest Karol Wojtyla began a new stage in his
journey with the Lord and in the footsteps of the Lord. Karol had gone to the
Masuri lakes for his usual vacation, along with a group of young people who
loved canoeing. But he brought with him a letter inviting him to call on the
Primate of Poland, Cardinal Wyszynski. He could guess the purpose of the
meeting: he was to be appointed as the auxiliary Bishop of Krakow. Leaving the
academic world, leaving this challenging engagement with young people, leaving
the great intellectual endeavor of striving to understand and interpret the
mystery of that creature which is man and of communicating to today's world the
Christian interpretation of our being - all this must have seemed to him like
losing his very self, losing what had become the very human identity of this
young priest. Follow me - Karol Wojtyla accepted the appointment, for he heard
in the Church's call the voice of Christ. And then he realized how true are the
Lord's words: 'Those who try to make their life secure will lose it, but
those who lose their life will keep it' (Lk 17:33). Our Pope - and we all
know this - never wanted to make his own life secure, to keep it for himself; he
wanted to give of himself unreservedly, to the very last moment, for Christ and
thus also for us. And thus he came to experience how everything which he had
given over into the Lord's hands came back to him in a new way. His love of
words, of poetry, of literature, became an essential part of his pastoral
mission and gave new vitality, new urgency, new attractiveness to the preaching
of the Gospel, even when it is a sign of contradiction.
"Follow me! In October 1978 Cardinal Wojtyla once again heard the voice of the
Lord. Once more there took place that dialogue with Peter reported in the Gospel
of this Mass: 'Simon, son of John, do you love me? Feed my sheep!' To the
Lord's question, 'Karol, do you love me?,' the Archbishop of Krakow
answered from the depths of his heart: 'Lord you know everything; you know
that I love you.' The love of Christ was the dominant force in the life of
our beloved Holy Father. Anyone who ever saw him pray, who ever heard him
preach, knows that. Thanks to his being profoundly rooted in Christ, he was able
to bear a burden which transcends merely human abilities: that of being the
shepherd of Christ's flock, his universal Church. This is not the time to speak
of the specific content of this rich pontificate. I would like only to read two
passages of today's liturgy which reflect central elements of his message. In
the first reading, Saint Peter says - and with Saint Peter, the Pope himself - 'I
truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who
fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. You know the message he
sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ - he is Lord of
all' (Acts 10:34-36). And in the second reading, Saint Paul - and with Saint
Paul, our late Pope - exhorts us, crying out: 'My brothers and sisters, whom
I love and long for, my joy and my crown, stand firm in the Lord in this way, my
beloved' (Phil 4:1).
"Follow me! Together with the command to feed his flock, Christ proclaimed to
Peter that he would die a martyr's death. With those words, which conclude and
sum up the dialogue on love and on the mandate of the universal shepherd, the
Lord recalls another dialogue, which took place during the Last Supper. There
Jesus had said: 'Where I am going, you cannot come.' Peter said to him, 'Lord,
where are you going?' Jesus replied: 'Where I am going, you cannot follow
me now; but you will follow me afterward.' (Jn 13:33,36). Jesus from the
Supper went towards the Cross, went towards his resurrection - he entered into
the paschal mystery; and Peter could not yet follow him. Now - after the
resurrection - comes the time, comes this 'afterward.' By shepherding the flock
of Christ, Peter enters into the paschal mystery, he goes towards the cross and
the resurrection. The Lord says this in these words: '... when you were
younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But
when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten
a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go' (Jn 21:18). In
the first years of his pontificate, still young and full of energy, the Holy
Father went to the very ends of the earth, guided by Christ. But afterwards, he
increasingly entered into the communion of Christ's sufferings; increasingly he
understood the truth of the words: 'Someone else will fasten a belt around
you.' And in this very communion with the suffering Lord, tirelessly and
with renewed intensity, he proclaimed the Gospel, the mystery of that love which
goes to the end (cf. Jn 13:1).
"He interpreted for us the paschal mystery as a mystery of divine mercy. In his
last book, he wrote: The limit imposed upon evil 'is ultimately Divine Mercy'.
2 And reflecting on the
assassination attempt, he said: 'In sacrificing himself for us all, Christ
gave a new meaning to suffering, opening up a new dimension, a new order: the
order of love ... It is this suffering which burns and consumes evil with the
flame of love and draws forth even from sin a great flowering of good' (pp.
189-190). Impelled by this vision, the Pope suffered and loved in communion with
Christ, and that is why the message of his suffering and his silence proved so
eloquent and so fruitful.
"Divine Mercy: the Holy Father found the purest reflection of God's mercy in the
Mother of God. He, who at an early age had lost his own mother, loved his divine
mother all the more. He heard the words of the crucified Lord as addressed
personally to him: 'Behold your Mother.' And so he did as the beloved
disciple did: he took her into his own home (eis ta idia: Jn 19:27) - 'Totus
tuus.' And from the mother he learned to conform himself to Christ.
"None of us can ever forget how in that last Easter Sunday of his life, the Holy
Father, marked by suffering, came once more to the window of the Apostolic
Palace and one last time gave his blessing 'urbi et orbi.' We can be sure
that our beloved Pope is standing today at the window of the Father's house,
that he sees us and blesses us. Yes, bless us, Holy Father. We entrust your dear
soul to the Mother of God, your Mother, who guided you each day and who will
guide you now to the eternal glory of her Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen."

References:
- "Official English Translation of Homily from Pope John Paul
Funeral Mass," LifeSiteNews, 2005-APR-08. See
http://www.LifeSiteNews.com
- Pope John Paul II, "Memory and identity: Conversations at the Dawn of a
Millennium," Rixxoli, (2005), Page 60-61.
Read
reviews or order this book safely from Amazon.com online book store. In The
Publishers Weekly review said: "Though advance publicity has focused on
the pope's description of the 1981 attempt on his life and on several
comments on abortion and homosexuality, most of the book is devoted to
rigorous discussion—laced with quotations from the Bible, documents of
Vatican II and his own poetry—about the nature of evil, especially as seen
in Nazi and Communist regimes; the nature of freedom, with its concomitant
responsibilities; and the challenges facing post-Enlightenment, secular
Europe."
- Ibid, Page 189-190.

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Originally posted: 2005-APR-09
Latest update: 2005-APR-09
Author: B.A. Robinson

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