To avoid living like pagans, Christians must guard against the temptation of "slipping toward worldliness and power" and of seeking Jesus only to fulfill their material interests, said Pope Francis. "This is the daily temptation for Christians, for all of us who make up the church," the pope said at his morning Mass April 20 in the Domus Sanctae Marthae. After the miracle of the multiplication of the loaves and fishes, the people in the day's Gospel account (Jn 6:22-29) seek Jesus not "because of the religious awe that leads one to worship God," the pope said, but "for their material interests." When one tries to profit from following Jesus -- an attitude frequently shown in the Gospels -- then one "risks not understanding" and even obscuring the "true mission of Jesus," said the pope. "Many people follow Jesus for their own interests," the pope said. "Even among his apostles: the sons of Zebedee, who wanted to be prime minister and finance minister, sought power. That fervor to bring Good News to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind, freedom to the oppressed and to proclaim a year of favor, becomes obscured," he said. "It is lost and it is transformed into something of power."
The spiritual climax of the Gospel of John, as Father John Waiss points out, occurs at the foot of the Cross, where Jesus utters his parting words: “Woman, behold, your son!” and “Behold your mother!” (John 19:26-27). While these words were addressed to the Apostle John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, the Church has long understood this moment as a universal adoption. To truly image Christ, we must share in His parentage; if we embrace God as our spiritual Father but reject Mary as our mother, we treat Christ as a half-brother rather than our "firstborn among many brethren" (Rom. 8:29). As Origen noted as early as the third century, the profound depths of the Gospel are only accessible to those who, like John, rest their heads on Jesus’ breast and receive Mary into their own homes. This maternal role is deeply rooted in biblical typology, positioning Mary as the fulfillment of the great mothers of the Old Covenant. She is the New Eve , the mother of all the living according ...