Nicosia, Cyprus, Jun 5, 2010 / 14:18 pm
In his homily this afternoon in Cyprus, the Holy Father spoke of the world’s need for the “Cross of Christ,” and explained that it alone is capable of providing the “unlimited hope” that every human heart craves.
Pope Benedict began his homily in reference to the Cross of Christ, saying that while many wonder why Christians “celebrate an instrument of torture,” he explained, it is because of the death and resurrection of Christ that the cross also represents “the definitive triumph of God’s love over all the evil in the world.”
After briefly reflecting on man’s struggles in Salvation History, the Pontiff said that, “we see clearly that man cannot save himself from the consequences of his sin. … Only God can release him from his moral and physical enslavement. And because he loved the world so much, he sent his only-begotten Son, not to condemn the world – as justice seemed to demand – but so that through him the world might be saved.”
This makes the cross “something far greater and more mysterious than it at first appears,” he continued. “It is indeed an instrument of torture, suffering and defeat, but at the same time it expresses the complete transformation, the definitive reversal of these evils: that is what makes it the most eloquent symbol of hope that the world has ever seen. It speaks to all who suffer – the oppressed, the sick, the poor, the outcast, the victims of violence – and it offers them hope that God can transform their suffering into joy, their isolation into communion, their death into life. It offers unlimited hope to our fallen world.”