Gulf Pine Catholic

Gulf Pine Catholic • March 15, 2024 9 God’s gift to us is His son, Jesus Christ, and that gift brings us forgiveness, healing, peace, and shows us the love of God in mercy, God’s gift of compassion is for each and every one of us. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life” (John 3:16). Sometimes this is overwhelming to try to comprehend -- a love so deep and complete. The parable of the Prodigal Son gives us a glimpse of that love and Jesus’ particular concern for the lost, and God’s love for the repentant sinner. And to all who respond in faith and repentance to the word Jesus preaches, He brings salvation, peace, and abundant life. After His resurrection, Jesus instructs Mary Magdalen to, “Go to my brothers and tell them, ‘I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God’ ” (John 20:17b, emphasis added). To be a disciple of Jesus is to be in the same relationship of loving intimacy with God the Father that Jesus has, to be sons and daughters of God, sharing in Jesus’ divine relationship with God the Father. The source of this relationship is the Holy Spirit! In Luke 11:13 after Jesus has shared the Lord’s Prayer and continues to teach on prayer, he says, “If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?” This most desirable of all gifts from the Father is what he most desires to give us, the gift of the Holy Spirit. Through the Holy Spirit we pray, through the Holy Spirit we enter into that loving, intimate relationship with Jesus and with our Father as his beloved sons and daughters! SEE BISHOP’S MESSAGE IN SPANISH, PAGE 4 Bishop’s Column From page 3 Act of Contrition is affirmation of God’s loving mercy, pope says VATICAN CITY ( CNS ) -- AChristian’s awareness of being sinful should be directly proportional to their “per- ception of the infinite love of God,” Pope Francis said. "The more we sense God ’ s tenderness, the more we desire to be in full communion with Him and the more evident the ugliness of evil in our lives becomes,” the pope said in a speech written for priests and seminar- ians attending a course on confession offered by the Ap- ostolic Penitentiary, the Vatican tribunal that deals with matters of conscience. The pope ’ s text, which he did not read but was dis- tributed to participants, focused on the Act of Contrition, the prayer that penitents recite during the sacrament of reconciliation. The awareness of God's love and mercy, the pope wrote, “pushes us to reflect on ourselves and our actions, and to convert. Let ’ s remember that God never tires of forgiving us and that we should never tire of asking him for pardon.” Pope Francis wrote that “it is beautiful” when a peni- tent, reciting the Act of Contrition, recognizes that God is “all good and deserving of all my love.” Zelenskyy, Ukrainian church, respond to pope’s call for negotiations BY JUSTIN MCLELLAN Catholic News Service VATICAN CITY ( CNS ) -- Pope Francis’ comment that Ukraine should have the “courage of the white flag” and engage in negotiation to end its war with Rus- sia was dismissed by the Ukrainian government and church leaders. In an interview with the Swiss broadcaster RSI , the pope had said the stronger side in the war in Ukraine “is the one who looks at the situation, thinks about the people and has the courage of the white flag, and nego- tiates.” Elsewhere in the interview, released in part March 9, the pope specified that “negotiation is never a sur- render.” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy clearly alluded to the pope’s comments in his nightly video ad- dress March 10 but made no explicit reference to Pope Francis. Zelenskyy, speaking in Ukrainian in a video with English subtitles, thanked Ukrainian military chaplains on the frontline for supporting the troops “with prayer, conversation and deeds.” “This is what the church is -- it is together with peo- ple, not two and a half thousand kilometers away some- where virtually mediating between someone who wants to live and someone who wants to destroy you,” he said. Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, was more direct in a March 10 post on X , criticizing the pope’s call for negotiations as putting good and evil “on the same footing” and urging the Vatican to “avoid re- peating the mistakes of the past and to support Ukraine and its people in their just struggle for their lives.” “Our flag is a yellow and blue one,” he said. “This is the flag by which we live, die, and prevail. We shall never raise any other flags.” The bishops of the Permanent Synod of the Ukrai- nian Greek Catholic Church released a statement March 10 in which they said that “with Putin there will be no true negotiations.” “Notwithstanding the suggestions for a need for negotiations coming from representatives of different countries, including the Holy Father himself, Ukrai- nians will continue to defend freedom and dignity to achieve a peace that is just,” said the statement signed by bishops including Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, major archbishop of Kyiv-Halych, and Archbishop Borys Gudziak, head of the Ukrainian Archeparchy of Philadelphia. “Every Russian occupation of Ukrainian terri- tory leads to the eradication of the Ukrainian Catholic Church, any independent Ukrainian Orthodox Church, and to the suppression of other religions and all institu- tions and cultural expressions that do not support Rus- sian hegemony,” the statement continued. Andrii Yurash, Ukrainian ambassador to the Vati- can, went on Italian public television March 10 and said in dealing with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, the in- ternational community should learn from the lessons of World War II. “The greatest lesson from this war is that no one tried to put Hitler at ease” but rather “everyone tried to weaken him and to strengthen his adversaries.” Poland’s foreign minister responded to a post on X March 10 with the pope’s comments suggesting the pope should try “encouraging Putin to have the courage to withdraw his army from Ukraine.” Several diplomatic representatives to the Vatican posted on X to support their solidarity with Ukraine af- ter the pope’s comments were reported, including the European Union representative and the British and Ger- man ambassadors to the Holy See. Matteo Bruni, director of the Vatican press office, told reporters March 9 that Pope Francis’ “white flag” comment was meant “to indicate the cessation of hos- tilities, a truce reached with the courage of negotiation” and not a surrender.