Seek God through his Mother, Pope encourages faithful

Cagliari, Italy, Sep 22, 2013 / 12:15 pm

During his Sunday homily in Sardinia, the Pope explained how we should seek Christ through the intercession of our Blessed Mother, whose life was an example of faithful prayer and trust in God.

"Let us not grow tired of knocking at God's door," he told crowds Sept. 22 in Cagliari, Sardinia. "Let us go to the heart of God through Mary, our whole life, every day, knocking at the door of God's heart!"

"Mary prays – prays together with the community of disciples, and teaches us to have full faith in God, in his mercy. This is the power of prayer!" he told the faithful.

The Pope recounted how Mary stood with the "beloved disciple" John at the foot of the Cross.

Jesus entrusted them to one another, the Pope said, and in that moment, "we are all there in John."

It is "loving gaze of Jesus that entrusts us to the maternal custody of his Mother."

However, her time at the foot of the Cross was not the first time Mary experienced the Divine "loving gaze" Pope Francis explained. 

"Mary will have remembered another gaze of love, when she was a young woman, the gaze of God the Father, that saw her humility, her littleness."

Mary's relationship with God serves as a model for every Christian.

She "teaches us that God does not abandon us, he can do great things even with our weakness," explained Pope Francis. "Let us have faith in Him! Let us knock at the door of his heart!"

With the love she has received from God, Mary turns to love her children that Jesus put in her care before he died on the Cross.

In the tender gaze of Mary, said the Pontiff, we find "reflection of the gaze of the Father, which has made her the Mother of God, and the gaze of the Son from the Cross, that has made her our Mother."

"And with that look today Mary is watching us. We need her tender gaze, her maternal gaze that knows us better than anyone else, her gaze full of compassion and care."

As the Pope preached, the traditional Sardinian statue of Our Lady of Bonaria stood nearby. 

"Bonaria" means "good air" or "fair wind." In Spanish, it is "Buenos Aires," the name of Pope Francis' hometown.

It is said that the Argentinian city received its name from a Sardinian sailor who arrived with early explorers in 1536. He insisted upon naming the land after his ancestral patroness.

After Mass, the Holy Father greeted local authorities as well as the ill and infirmed who had been brought to the cathedral to meet him. He blessed those who were suffering and prayed with those who sought healing.

Pope Francis stopped to greet a large group of nuns in various habits that welcomed him enthusiastically. 

He thanked them for their "sustaining" lives of sacrifice and asked for their prayers.

He then continued on to meet with local bishops before returning to the cathedral to speak to the poor and prisoners.