This young person asked him if it's true that he doesn't watch television, and he also asked the Pope for his opinion about the Internet.
The Pope said that television producers should make content that helps people prepare for life. He asked people who watch it to be responsible.
POPE FRANCIS
"You must learn how to choose what you watch. If I see that a program is not good for me, hurts my values, makes me vulgar or has vulgarity, I have to change the channel.”
He said that using the Internet is similar. It can be an educational tool, but users must avoid whatever prevents them from being a better person.
POPE FRANCIS
"If you young people become attached the computer, and become a slave to the computer, you lose your freedom. And if you look at dirty content on the computer, you lose your dignity. Watch TV and use the computer, but for the good things, the big things, the things that make us grow.”
-http://www.romereports.com/pg161729-pope-to-youth-in-sarajevo-if-you-look-at-dirty-content-on-the-computer-you-lose-your-dignity-en#, 6 June 2015
"If you look at dirty content on the computer, you lose your dignity"
Fertile chastity: mothers and not old maids
I am happy to meet you today and I wish to greet each one of you, thanking you for what you do to make consecrated life a constant light in the life of the Church
Dear sisters,
First of all I thank my dear brother Cardinal Joao Braz de Aviz, for the words which he has just addressed to me. I am also pleased to see here the secretary of the Congregation: his name is ‘Pepe’…
The theme of your conference seems to me to be particularly important for the task which has been entrusted to you: “The service of leadership according to the Gospel.” In light of this, I would like to propose three simple thoughts which I leave for you to deepen on a personal and community level.
Jesus, at the Last Supper, turns to his Apostles with these words: You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you (John 15.16) which reminds us all, not just us priests, that a vocation is always God’s initiative. It is Christ who has called you to follow Him in the consecrated life and this means making a continual ‘exodus’ from yourselves to centre your existences on Christ and his Gospel, on God’s will, letting go of your projects so that you can say with St Paul “It is no longer I who lives, but Christ who lives in me.” This ‘exodus from oneself means placing oneself on a journey of adoration and service. An exodus which takes us on a journey of adoration of the Lord and service to the Lord in our brothers and sisters. To adore and to serve: two attitudes which can not be separated but which must always go together. Adore the Lord and serve others, without keeping anything for ourselves: this is the ‘letting go’ of those who exercise authority. Always live and recall the centrality of Christ, the evangelical identity of the consecrated life. Help your communities to live ‘the exodus’ of self on the journey of adoration and service, first of all through the three pivots of your existence.
Obedience as listening to God's will, in the interior motion of the Holy Spirit authenticated by the Church, accepting that obedience also passes through human mediations. … Poverty, which teaches solidarity, sharing, and charity and which is also expressed in a soberness and joy of the essential, to put us on guard against the material idols that obscure the true meaning of life. Poverty, which is learned with the humble, the poor, the sick, and all those who are at the existential margins of life. Theoretical poverty doesn't do anything. Poverty is learned by touching the flesh of the poor Christ in the humble, the poor, the sick, and in children.
And then chastity, as a precious charism, that enlarges the freedom of your gift to God and others with Christ's tenderness, mercy, and closeness. Chastity for the Kingdom of Heaven shows how affection has its place in mature freedom and becomes a sign of the future world, to make God's primacy shine forever. But, please, [make it] a 'fertile' chastity, which generates spiritual children in the Church. The consecrated are mothers: they must be mothers and not 'spinsters'! Forgive me if I talk like this but this maternity of consecrated life, this fruitfulness is important! May this joy of spiritual fruitfulness animate your existence. Be mothers, like the images of the Mother Mary and the Mother Church. You cannot understand Mary without her motherhood; you cannot understand the Church without her motherhood, and you are icons of Mary and of the Church.”
We must never forget that true power, at whatever level, is service, which has its bright summit upon the Cross. … 'You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them ... But it shall not be so among you.'—This is precisely the motto of your assembly, isn't it? It shall not be so among you.—'Rather, whoever wishes to be great among you shall be your servant; whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave'.”
“Your vocation is a fundamental charism for the Church's journey and it isn't possible that a consecrated woman or man might 'feel' themselves not to be with the Church. A 'feeling' with the Church that has generated us in Baptism; a 'feeling' with the Church that finds its filial expression in fidelity to the Magisterium, in communion with the Bishops and the Successor of Peter, the Bishop of Rome, a visible sign of that unity,” the pontiff added, citing Paul VI: “It is an absurd dichotomy to think of living with Jesus but without the Church, of following Jesus outside of the Church, of loving Jesus without loving the Church. Feel the responsibility that you have of caring for the formation of your Institutes in sound Church doctrine, in love of the Church, and in an ecclesial spirit.”
“The centrality of Christ and his Gospel, authority as a service of love, and 'feeling' in and with the Mother Church: [these are] three suggestions that I wish to leave you, to which I again add my gratitude for your work, which is not always easy. What would the Church be without you? She would be missing maternity, affection, tenderness! A Mother's intuition.”
--Pope Francis
Text from page http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2013/05/08/pope_meets_with_heads_of_womens_religious_communities/en1-690219 of the Vatican Radio website
St Augustine's Prayer for Purity
O Lord, all my hope is based on Your great mercy. Give me what you command, and command what You will.
You command that we be continent. Someone has said that no one can be continent unless God grants it, but it is true wisdom to know from whom this gift comes.
Continence brings us recollection and the restoration of that unity we have lost in giving ourselves to too many things. He loves You less who loves, together with You, anything which he does not love for You.
O love, ever burning and never extinguished, O charity, O my God, inflame me!
You command me to be continent; give me what You command and command what You will.
-- St Augustine
Consecrating the five senses to God
O my sweet Lord,
I renew with all my heart the consecration of my senses to You.
I consecrate to You my eyes, that they may seek only Your Face and the things that lead to You;
I consecrate to You my tongue, that it may be worthy to sing Your praises and may never utter a word displeasing to You;
I consecrate to You my ears, that they may listen to Your voice alone and hear only what is necessary for Your service;
I consecrate to You my sense of smell, of taste, of touch, that they may take delight in You alone....!
-- Roman Breviary
SHAKESPEARE ON CHASTITY
Th' expense of spirit in a waste of shame
Is lust in action; and, till action, lust
Is perjured, murd'rous, bloody, full of blame,
Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust;
Enjoyed no sooner but despisèd straight; 5
Past reason hunted, and no sooner had,
Past reason hated, as a swallowed bait
On purpose laid to make the taker mad;
Mad in pursuit, and in possession so;
Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme; 10
A bliss in proof--and proved, a very woe;
Before, a joy proposed; behind, a dream.
All this the world well knows; yet none knows well
To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.
--William Shakespeare, Sonnet 129