Pope Francis focused his Thursday morning Homily at Casa Santa Marta on forgiveness and what it means for Christians to be merciful. He said that those who can't pardon other people cannot call themselves Christian.<\/p>\n
POPE FRANCIS
\n'If you can\u00e2??t forgive, you are not a Christian. \u00a0You may be a good man, a good woman\u00e2?\u00a6but you are not doing what our Lord did. \u00a0What\u00e2??s more, if you can\u00e2??t forgive, you cannot receive the peace of the Lord. And every day when we pray the \u00e2??Our Father:\u00e2?? Forgive us as we have forgiven those...It\u00e2??s a condition. We are trying to \u00e2??convince\u00e2?? God that we\u00e2??re good, that we\u00e2??re good by forgiving: in reverse. It\u00e2??s just words, right? As that beautiful song went: \u00e2??Words, words, words,\u00e2?? wasn\u00e2??t it? I think it was the Italian singer Mina who sung it. Words! Forgive one another! Just as the Lord has forgiven us, you do likewise.\u00e2?\u009d<\/p>\n
The Pope also said that priests who struggle with being merciful should not hear confessions. He said that Christians must understand people and not condemn them.\u00a0<\/p>\n
EXCERPTS FROM THE POPE'S HOMILY
\n(Source: Vatican Radio)<\/p>\n
'There are also many men and women who work hard -- \u00a0really hard \u00e2?? in order to manufacture lethal weapons, arms that eventually become bathed in the blood of so many innocent people, so many of them. There are wars (being waged)! \u00a0There are these wars and there is also that wickedness of preparing for war, of making weapons (to be used) against other people in order to kill! Peace saves us, peace makes you live, it makes you grow: war annihilates you, it drags you down.\u00e2?\u009d \u00a0<\/p>\n
'If you can\u00e2??t forgive, you are not a Christian. \u00a0You may be a good man, a good woman\u00e2?\u00a6. but you are not doing what our Lord did. \u00a0What\u00e2??s more, if you can\u00e2??t forgive, you cannot receive the peace of the Lord. And every day when we pray the \u00e2??Our Father:\u00e2?? Forgive us as we have forgiven those\u00e2?\u00a6...It\u00e2??s a condition. We are trying to \u00e2??convince\u00e2?? God that we\u00e2??re good, that we\u00e2??re good by forgiving: in reverse. \u00a0(It\u00e2??s just) words, right? As that beautiful song went: \u00a0 \u00e2??Words, words, words,\u00e2?? wasn\u00e2??t it? \u00a0I think it was (the Italian singer) Mina who sung it. Words! Forgive one another! Just as the Lord has forgiven us, do likewise.\u00e2?\u009d<\/p>\n
'If you are a priest and you can\u00e2??t manage to be merciful, tell your bishop who will give you a job in administration but please don\u00e2??t go into the confessional box! \u00a0A priest who is not merciful does a lot of harm in the confessional box! He beats people. \u00e2??No, Father, I am merciful but I\u00e2??m a bit stressed\u00e2?\u00a6.? It\u00e2??s true\u00e2?\u00a6. Before going to hear confessions, go to your doctor who will give you some pills to make you less stressed! But show mercy! \u00a0And also show mercy among ourselves. \u00e2??But this person did that\u00e2?\u00a6. \u00a0What have I done?\u00e2?? \u00e2??That person is more of a sinner than me!\u00e2?? \u00a0Which of us can say this, that the other person is more of a sinner than me? \u00a0None of us can say this! \u00a0Only our Lord knows this.\u00e2?\u009d<\/p>\n
ATO
\nCTV
\n-BN
\nUp:ATO<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
September 10, 2015. He said that priests who struggle to be merciful shouldn't hear confessions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":32847,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[195],"tags":[],"acf":{"video":"http:\/\/youtu.be\/nvi8ChPEqgs","video_descarga":"http:\/\/attuale.romereports.com\/news\/","international_url":"http:\/\/romereports.com.edgesuite.net\/news\/bstamarta1009int.mov","type":"bn","newsletter":"si"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54391"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54391"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54391\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.romereports.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}