WORLD DAY OF PRAYER FOR PEACE
1 JANUARY 2016
We begin the New Year as always with the celebration of the feast of Mary, the Mother of God. We place ourselves, our families, our Church and our people under her protection and we ask God’s blessing on us and on all we undertake in the year ahead.
The first day of the year is also celebrated by the Church as the World Day of Peace. Since the inauguration of this celebration 49 years ago the Holy Father has marked it each year by the publication of a Message for the World Day of Peace. This year Pope Francis’ Message is on the theme: “Overcome Indifference and Win Peace”. It is directed not just to Catholics or Christians, but to all people of good will.
Pope Francis begins his Message by declaring and sharing his profound conviction that “God is not indifferent. God cares about mankind. God does not abandon us”. God is not indifferent, but often we human beings are. Pope Francis says that indifference to the scourges of our time, to things like war and terrorism, ethnic or religious persecution, and the misuse of power, is the enemy of peace. Engagement and commitment must take the place of indifference. He calls on all of us to be engaged in the pursuit of justice and peace.
Looking back at the year gone by, Pope Francis takes heart from some of the events of 2015 which encourage us not to lose hope in our human ability to conquer evil and combat resignation and indifference. He singles out the efforts of world leaders at COP21 [climate change conference] in Paris to find new ways to confront climate change and protect the earth, our common home.
One of the tasks for us in the Church in Kilmore and in Ireland in the years ahead will be to rise to the challenges laid out for us by Pope Francis in his recent encyclical on the environment, Laudato Si. This will involve actions as individuals and as a community and a nation: to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, to curb our tendencies to consume ever more of the earth’s resources, and in general, to live more simply so that others may simply live. Everyone has a part to play.
Returning to the theme of the Jubilee Year of Mercy, Pope Francis he calls us to conversion:
We too, then, are called to make compassion, love, mercy and solidarity a true way of life, a rule of conduct in our relationships with one another. This requires a conversion of our hearts: the grace of God has to turn our hearts of stone into hearts of flesh, open to others in authentic solidarity.
If we are thinking of new year resolutions for 2016, there is plenty of food for thought there, and more in the full text of his Message. You may follow the link to the Holy Father’s Message on the Kilmore diocese website.
This year we are entering an important year for us as a nation – the centenary year of the Easter Rising of 1916. There will be many celebrations and commemorations of this foundational event in our history. It will be an important opportunity to take stock of where we are as a people and how we have lived up to the noble ideals enunciated in the Proclamation of the Republic. It will also be a time for looking at how we can do things better in the future, in the interests of the generations coming after us.
May I take this opportunity to wish you all a very happy and peaceful New Year and every blessing in the year ahead.
