Wednesday, December 28, 2016

Pope Francis: Like Abram, Christians must "hope against hope"

Pope Francis arrives in the Paul VI Audience Hall for his weekly General Audience - ANSA

28/12/2016 13:29

Pope Francis said that even this moment of questioning by Abram is a form of Faith. Despite his disappointment, Abram continued to believe in God – or else why would he complain to Him? Faith, the Pope said, “is not only silence that accepts everything without reply, hope is not a certainty that makes you secure from doubts and perplexity.” Faith can also be “struggling with God, showing our bitterness without ‘pious’ fictions.” And hope, he continued, “is also not being afraid to see reality for what it is and to accept the contradictions.”The sign that God gives to Abram – “Look at the heavens and count the stars… just so will your descendants be” – is “a call to continue to believe and to hope.” To believe, the Pope concluded, “it is necessary to know how to see with the eyes of faith: They are only stars, which everyone can see, but for Abram they have to become the sign of the faithfulness of God.”And this, Pope Francis said, is the journey of hope that each one of us must walk.
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Taken from: http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2016/12/28/pope_like_abram,_christians_must_hope_against_hope/1282123