GENERAL AUDIENCE: "MARY, ESCHATOLOGICAL ICON OF THE CHURCH"
VATICAN CITY,
MAR 14, 2001 (VIS) - The theme of John Paul II's catechesis
for today's
general audience, held in the Paul VI Hall, was: "Mary,
Eschatological Icon
of the Church." As he entered the hall, the Pope passed
slowly through the
atrium and the center aisle, stopping frequently to
greet those
present.
In his catechesis the Pope observed that St. John's Book of
Revelation
tells of a Child's birth, which "represents the coming of the
Messiah, and
the woman evidently personifies the people of God, both the
biblical Israel
and the Church. ... Against Mary and the Church rises the
dragon
representing Satan and evil. ... Mary, her Son, and the Church,
represent
the seeming weakness and smallness of love, truth, and justice.
Against
them is unleashed the enormous destructive energy of violence,
deceit, and
injustice."
"The time of distress, persecution and trial,"
he continued, "is not,
therefore, indefinite: at the end liberation will come
and it will be the
hour of glory."
John Paul II affirmed that,
"contemplating this mystery in a marian
perspective, we can state that
'Mary, at the side of her Son, is the most
perfect image of freedom and of the liberation of humanity
and of the
universe'."
"We fix, then, our
gaze upon Mary," the Pope added, "icon of the pilgrim
Church in the desert of
history, but stretched out towards the glorious
goal of the heavenly
Jerusalem."
The Pope concluded the catechesis:
"In her glorious Assumption into
heaven Mary
is the image of the creature called by the risen Christ to
attain, at
the end of history, the fullness of communion with God in the
resurrection
for a blessed eternity. For the Church which often feels
the
weight of history and the siege of evil, the Mother of Christ is
the
luminous emblem of a humanity redeemed and transformed by the grace
that
saves."
During a brief ceremony at the end of the audience, the
Holy Father
received from BMW Italy a gift of a BMW 740i Protection and eight
BMW C1
models for his use and that of Vatican City
State.
AG/MARY:ICON:CHURCH/... VIS 20010314 (350)
