DIOCESE OF NOVALICHES

Commission on Faith & Formation

Social Communications and Media Ministry
Christ The King Parish, Atlas Street, Filinvest 2,
Batasan Hills, Q.C. 1126 * 5145318 / 5145312

4TH WORLD APOSTOLIC CONGRESS ON MERCY (WACOM 4)

CELEBRATION OF THE MOST HOLY EUCHARIST
DAY 5 - JANUARY 20, 2017 - LAS CASAS FILIPINAS DE AZUCAR, BATAAN

Transcript of the talk of H.E. Philippe Cardinal Barbarin, D.D., Archbishop of Lyon, France;
Special Papal Envoy at the 4th World Apostolic Congress (WACOM IV)

Sent as a Church of Mercy in the world at the great Mass at UST on Tuesday, Bishop Socbegins with
those words, The Divine Mercy is the essential nucleus and the center of our faith. And so, it is the
most important message of the Bible. Every or when you read the Bible yourself everyday, Lord, show
me your mercy.

From the very beginning of the history of the Hebrew people, God, when God gives His mission to
Moses, he tells Moses, I saw the misery of my people. Thats why I would like, I came down to you.
Gods heart is certain so that looking at our misery it is impossible for Him not to come to us, to come
down to us. And He tells Moses,When I am, with you I am here. I am present to you. You're zealot.

And when Moses comes down from the Sinai Mountain, with the tablet of the Law, God gives him the
definition of His mercy. Once Pope John Paul II said that the mercy of God, that's the name of God. So
pay much attention to this verse. You will have to learn it by heart: Exodus 7:34-36.

Five words. The first one: I love you with all my God, with my God. Like the father of the prodigal
sinner who was waiting for his son every evening looking for him, just waiting for him.

The second one is the word of praise. He wants us to be precious, to be full of His beauty, unique
beauty, everybody of us. His beauty, His grace.

Third word is Pontificat, the effort. God says I am slow to anger. We dont like this word. Why does he
get angry? Because it is impossible for Him to do another way. Otherwise, we wouldn't listen to any
word of His. If once God gets angry with you, let Him do. It is because you need that.

The fourth word. He has a great love, such a quantity of love that is without limit. It is like overflowing
mountain of love flowing down to the world.

And the last word of mercy, it is verse 6 of this, of the Bible...It is that always we be faithful to you. So I
hope you will remember these five words.

So the first word is that it's full of love, coming from God. The second one is the beauty, the grace of
God, The third one it is that He gets angry with us, we need that. We need that. The fourth one is that;
it is the overflowing fountain of mercy flowing down to the world. And the fifth one, he is faithful to
us.

So, at the beginning of the New Testament, you are sentenced explaining all these. When Jesus begins
his mission on the Jordan river, He has, He was just baptized by John the Baptist. And we still listen
here the voice of the Lord, No more on Moses, by the one Jesus. And you know this sentence in Him, I
fill Him with the hope, all my mercy, all my love.

So, we have to look at Jesus. Contemplate. To imitate him. And in the Gospel all the time to gaze at
him. Which is the most beautiful parable of the Divine Mercy: we can say there are two parables.
There is the prodigal son and the Good Samaritan.

I saw the miseried cavait, and so I came down to you. And he got worried with, it was carefully kept
for, those wounded. He cared for him. It will heal with by the oil. He took him on Himself. He took him
to the other. He told the guy, Be careful all of you are responsible for hotel here. Care for him. Take
care of him. Because he is suffering a lot.

The savior that is Jesus. But You be the one to care for him.

You know there is a very beautiful sentence just before the Parable of the Good Samaritan. Look for
this sentence in your head: Blessed the eyes that seeing what you are seeing. The complete sentence
would be: Blessed the eyes, blessed also the ears hearing to what you are hearing. Blessed the other
prophets. And now that God came to us we saw amongst us the mercy of God in them. So when the
Holy Father speaks of the church of the mercy of God, this is just the hotel of the Good Samaritan.

Do you remember, as he said, I would like the church to be a hospital of...those who are sick, those
who despair, those who are dependent on alcoholic. Take care of them.

Why is the Church called the Church of the Mercy of God? Because the whole Mercy of God is in
Jesus and because we are the Body of Christ. We would need the Church...to be open. That we may
tell to all those who are suffering--the poor who are despaired--come, doors are open! Come to pray
over!

So the title of my talk is exactly the aim Pope Francis is looking at: "A Church of the Mercy of God
Within the World."

Then, He sends us. He sends us to the world. But enough our doors to be opened, we also, let go
walking to look for those who are suffering.

You know, when Jesus sends us in mission, He told us before that it would be difficult, even dangerous.
He sends you like as lambs among wolves, go and teach all the nations. Its dangerous. When you are
right in my country in France. At the same moment, that the, from the very beginnings from the
very beginning of Christianity in my town, Rio, 50 Martyrs and more or less in all the countries of the
world.
Go teach all the nations and baptized them in the Name of the Father, the Son and Holy Spirit. Maybe,
probably we are fighting and he understands us.

He promised us marvelously, I will be with you everyday until the end of the world. The sentence I
prefer is the last expression Jesus gave us before leaving. Do you know this?

In my Diocese, I request, I ask all the young people coming for confirmation that they may love by
heart this sentence of Jesus. Its a great comfort for your heart.

Thats Jesus last sentence. Keep it by heart. Its at the beginning of the Acts of the Apostles. Just
before the Ascension. You will receive the strength. The strength of the Holy Spirit, which will come
upon you and you will become my witnesses and to the ends of the world. That so the Gospel went
and to Samoa. This is mission.

We are sent to proclaim the mercy of God everywhere. What is building the Church? Jesus not we. We
are just little servants. Even to the first of firsts, He told them that, "You are Rock, Peter, and on this
rock I will build my church."

And so I hope everybody of us, that we may be all, a little slow, a little rock in Jesus' hands. Available,
available, so that Jesus may do with us what he wants. We make the work of Jesus. We continue
Jesus work. We are the work of God. We are the Mercy of God continuing His work, His job within the
world. The whole commitment of God in His work, we found it in the person of Jesus.

That we belong to this great movement of the Divine Mercy. Everybody in its place.

There is a theologian, I know very much of him. He was a Swiss. His name is Hans Ul Baltazar. He wrote
a lot of books. He wrote a little one, a small one, magnificent. Which is the title of our work of our
mission. The name: Predicament. We are within the coming of God. We are in the Jesus mission. We
are wishing this overflowing water flowing down to the world.

In the night from Wednesday to Thursday, I went with Fr. Matthew to the streets in Manila. He is a
young French priest and he is caring for the poorchildren in the streets. We are, you are, they are
toxico dependent. They are just abandoned, you know. He takes them with himself and brings them to
homes for youth.

In Manila, he founded 27 homes for youth, hundreds and hundreds of children. So, in Manila, by
himself, he founded 27 houses of the Good Samaritan. So, our great question, What are you going to
do now? And what am I going to do now. This is the great question to, of Pope Francis: Is our Church a
Church of mercy?

When Pope Francis came to the Philippines two years ago, January 2015, he got all the children of Fr.
Matthew. Are we going to do, to operate in the same way as Fr. Matthew. Do we have to find new
methods?

And new proposition of the troubles in the darkness of our era? Do we need to find very efficacious
methods? Or those who will have the best ability? NO. Just have faith. The grace of God is acting, is
working in the heart of the children of God everytime, all the time. Just let the Grace of God fill you at
work, through you operate in you and you will be witness of new.

This happens in, in old centuries. In France, for example at those times, when children were left on the
street in very frozen the weather...We just could see, look at the charity of mercy.

Saint Vincent of Paul, he took all the children all to himself to care for them. At those times the Clergy,
the priests, were very cruel. And so he cared also for priests. He founded seminaries. As soon as he
sees misery, he cares for the people.

And three centuries later in the streets of Calcutta, we had Mother TeresaIn all centuries, all eras, in
most misery of that were mercy entering the world through new witnesses. So what are you going to
do? What am I going to do?

So the first thing is to have open eyes because you have somebody, some people who want to be
blind. Remember the first sentence of the Law that I quoted from Exodus book. He says, "I saw the
miseries of my people and I came down to you."

Who does not want to see will close his eyes and won't do anything.

So, at the end of this 4th World Congress, we have grace, special grace for us all. So, Lord keep our
eyes opened and then, we will move to operate, to act, to work mercy.

And so when we will deal with the people will we have enough mercy. And you know the solution. If
Jesus is alive in you, you there will be mercy. Otherwise no mercy. He came to dwell in us through our
baptism.

He is present. He is alive. And thats why we have his name Christians. So the mercy of God must be
alive in us, so that it may be living in us. We must have our eyes focused on Jesus. Fixed on him. These
are the quotations of the Gospel we like.

You know when we read an, of an encounter with Jesus with a sick with a sinner, looking at all of you
the passages of the Gospel you prefer. Everybody likes the meeting, the encounter with the samaritan
woman. The meeting with the adultery woman. The encounter with Zaccaheus. The encounter with
Matthew when he grasped him out from the money and he tells him follow me; come and follow me.

So these encounters between the Mercy of God and the misery, we have to focus on them and to
contemplate them in a long time. Some essential insights in scriptures to finish. When Jesus
encountered needs--somebody, his--he pays attention to the...person and the whole being. The
meeting with the Samaritan woman, it deals with the body because he is, it is hot. We are thirsty. We
are hungry. We are tired.

Then we pay attention to our person because she is a woman, because she is a Samaritan, because
Jesus is a Jew. And shes woman, she is a woman and she had trouble affecting life; difficult one. Look
for your husband. Ive no husband. She had 5 husbands now she has a 6th one but shes waiting for
the true husband; a spouse.
She loves but she is not able to love. She would like to love. Precisely, she is meeting the Love, the
Mercy and discovering that he is...a great prophet. She tells him, Tell me about God. What does it
mean to adore him?

So the mercy of God takes care of the whole being, the whole person. Because my whole person is
interesting for the Lord. He wants to heal me, my person.

The second thing is that Jesus want, wants to save every human being, even, and especially those
whom the people do not like.

For example, Zaccheus, nobody likes him. Of course, he was stealing the money of everybody. Jesus is
going through and he looks at him and he tells, Come down Zaccheus. I want to dwell in your house
today.

I like this Gospel so much because in this Gospel, Jesus says twice, Today. So the mercy of God is
today. We would like to have this machine, to register to have registered all the words Jesus would
have said to Zacchaeus. And also to listen, to every, to all the words Zacchaeus told Jesus about his
sufferings, about his search.

The other people excluded him as somebody robbing. Then Jesus put him in the middle of the people
and said this one is a true son of Abraham. Thats mercy.

Other people you probably do not like at all. Remember those men around of the adultery women
telling, Shes an adulterer. We found her in a sinner.

Describe the Pharisees. Do you like them? I know you dont like them. They want to ensnare Jesus. Of
course, Jesus is more intelligent than they are. Yes, you are right. The Lord tells that the truth that
adultery is a great sin. So, the one among you who never sinned may stone her with the first stone.

And Jesus is just writing in the sand...And so Jesus lifts up and looks around and says, Why? What did
they, did they walk away? Myself, I think that Jesus was very sad at this very moment. He would like
them to stay, to be with her. So he would have been able to forgive all of them. Yes, she commuted
adultery. She needed to be forgiven. They need also to be forgiven. And Jesus wants to forgive all of
them; Everybody of them without any limits.

Sometimes we see that Jesus has limits; has got limits. You remember the Canaanite woman who is
no doubt possessed by the devil? Do something for my daughter. The apostles are not that merciful,
you know, "She is shouting all the time, so do something that, that she may not break our neck."

So Jesus says, "I cannot do anything because I just saved all the lands of Israel."

And the woman says, "I don't care for any word of you. I just want you to heal my daughter."

It's ok for you to obey God but I want you to heal not to punish my daughter. And so, here we see the
mercy of Jesus. He comes over the rule books and He says, woman great is your faith; your daughter
is healed.
Jesus is always obedient...

So, this is what I try. I want to tell you. The only method today; the unique method to become merciful
today. It is to contemplate Jesus who is the own mercy of God. To imitate Jesus because He works
within us and to keep on in His work of mercy to work with the work of Mercy within the world.

And so that you may never be discouraged, He spelled before his great challenge. Remember, the last
sentence of the Gospel of Saint Matthew, which is a great promise to us: I am always with you until
the end of the world, of the times. Amen!

I was touched deeply in my heart by the Will of the Holy Father to send me here as a special envoy. Of
course, I think of Cardinal Schonborn, he should be here but he was not, his health did not allow it. I
think also of Bishop Demorio, who started this Congress, this World Congress with Cardinal
Schonborn. Bishop Demorio today, its his anniversary, 80 years old. Did you know, tomorrow is
Cardinal Schonborn's birthday, 32.

And so in my town in Lyon, there is a magnificent Shrine of the Virgin Mary. It's name is Basilica of
Notre-Dame de Fourvire. I hope you will visit Our Lady of Fourvire. In the Basilica of Fourvire, we
have all the statues of the Virgin Mary of the world. And all the Filipinos living in France came to Lyon,
when we set up the Virgin Mary of Navarra. So, I will give our Bishop Roberto a book about the
Basilica of Fourvire.

Follow us:
Website = http://www.novalichesdiocese.org
Facebook = https://www.facebook.com/NovalichesDiocese
Instagram = https://www.instagram.com/dioceseofnovaliches/
Pinterest = https://www.pinterest.com/ndiocese/
Twitter = https://twitter.com/RCBN_DioNova
Scribd = https://www.scribd.com/user/303077242/Diocese-Novaliches
YouTube = https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcdMS3e5VijTjv_JFnljFGQ
SoundCloud = https://soundcloud.com/diocese-novaliches