Vatican City, Dec 2, 2007 / 09:38 am
Bearing a message of Christian hope, the Holy Father visited the “San Giovanni Battista” Hospital, stressing that hospitals can become “privileged places that are a testimony to the Christian love that fuels hope.”
In the Hospital for the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, the Holy Father celebrated Mass for the first Sunday of Advent with more than 350 parishioners, dozens of patients, along with their families, doctors and nurses.
In his homily, the Pope noted that this liturgical season is a time of Christian hope – to which he has devoted his second encyclical, "Spe Salvi".
The Pope explained that we need hope in the great and small things to keep us on God’s path. “Without great hope, it is not enough to overcome everything else. This great hope can only be God, who embraces the universe and can give us what we alone cannot achieve.”