When the church has a problem to solve or a big decision to make, the Holy Spirit works by helping people discuss the issues openly and frankly, not by fomenting gossip and backroom deals, Pope Francis said. "In a church where people always argue and there are factions, and brothers and sisters betray each other, the Spirit is not there," he said in his homily May 8. The pope dedicated his morning Mass in the chapel of the Domus Sanctae Marthae to Our Lady of Lujan, patroness of his native Argentina, whose feast was celebrated that day. "The Spirit is the one who brings something new, who moves the situation forward, who creates new areas, who creates the wisdom that Jesus promised" and who creates "harmonious unity among everyone," he said, according to Vatican Radio. The pope talked about the day's first reading from the Acts of the Apostles in which the First Council of Jerusalem met to solve a dispute concerning whether Gentiles converting to Christianity had to observe all the laws of Moses as the Jewish Christians did. "How do they solve the problem?" the pope asked.
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 ...