March 29, 2000 LENTEN SPIRITUAL EXERCISES: (mar29van.htm)


		WEDNESDAY March 29, 2000 volume 11, no. 63	To print out entire text of Today's issue, go to	SECTION ONE SECTION TWO	INTRODUCTION TO THIS SPECIAL ON-LINE RETREAT: Thanks to ZENIT News Organization, we are able to bring you in its entirety each day the spiritual exercises that Retreat Master Archbishop Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan preached to the Holy Father and Curia the week just before the Pope's "Jubilee Journey" to the Holy Land. Because of the wonders of the internet, all readers can now share in the inspiration that touched the Vicar of Christ and give all readers the opportunity to make a Lenten On-Line Retreat, so to speak, by contemplating on what the Archbishop presents, then going in silent prayer and meditation as John Paul II and his staff did to gain a greater peace and spirituality. The ideal way is to be able to go before the Blessed Sacrament and attend Daily Mass, but if this is not possible, then quiet time with Our Lord in meditation and prayer is the best scenario. Each day we will bring you these spiritual exercises in chronological order to when the Archbishop presented them. Eventually, at the request of the Pope, there will be a book published containing the depth of these meditations.

SPECIAL ON-LINE LENTEN RETREAT Spiritual Exercises preached to the Holy Father and his staff just prior to his historic "Jubilee Journey" Day One: HOPE IS THE GREAT CHALLENGE TO THE MODERN WORLD
First Reflections of Papal Spiritual Exercises First Reflections of Papal Spiritual Exercises
conducted by Archbishop Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan, President of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace

Today's Introduction: On Sunday afternoon March 12, John Paul II began Spiritual Exercises, a week especially dedicated to prayer during which he suspended his public meetings. Archbishop François Xavier Nguyên Van Thuân, preacher of the Exercises, who spent 13 years in Vietnamese prisons, dedicated the first meditation to the topic, "Before the Mystery of God."

Love Is the Only Certainty

"These days of Exercises are a propitious time to sing our gratitude to the Lord, because 'His mercy is everlasting.' 'He lifts the indigent from the dust and the poor from the dung heap so that He may sit among the princes of His people.' We have not been chosen because of our merits, but only by His mercy. 'I have loved you with an everlasting love, says the Lord.' This is our security. This is our pride: awareness of being called and chosen for love," Archbishop Nguyên Van Thuân said.

Sinners and Prostitutes among Christ's Ancestors

In addressing the complex problem of sin and grace, Archbishop Nguyên Van Thuân explained that "If we consider the names of the kings present in the book of the genealogy of Jesus, we can see that only two of them were faithful to God: Hezekiah and Jeroboam. The rest were idolaters, immoral, murderers... In David, the most famous king of the Messiah's ancestors, sanctity and sin were mixed: with bitter tears he confessed his sins of adultery and murder in the psalms, especially Psalm 51 (50), which isn now a penitential prayer repeated in the Liturgy of the Church. The women Matthew mentions at the beginning of the Gospel, as mothers who transmit life and God's blessing in their womb, also cause commotion. All were in an irregular situation: Tamar is a sinner, Rahab a prostitute, Ruth a foreigner, the fourth woman he does not dare to mention by name. He only says that she had been the 'wife of Uriah' -- it was Bathsheba."

Sin Exalts the Mercy of God

"And yet, the river of history, full of sins and crimes, becomes a source of pure water to the degree we get closer to the fullness of time: In Mary, the Mother, and Jesus, the Messiah, all generations are saved. This list of sinful men and women that Matthew discloses in Jesus' genealogy does not scandalize us. It exalts the mystery of the mercy of God. Moreover, in the New Testament, Jesus chose Peter, who denied Him, and Paul, who persecuted Him. Nonetheless, they are now the pillars of the Church. When a people writes their official history, they speak of victories, heroes, and greatness. It is marvelous to see a people, whose official history, does not hide the sins of its ancestors," as is the case of the Chosen People, continued the points for meditation.

Hope Today

Awareness of the fragility of man and, above all, of God's love are two important guarantees of hope. Archbishop Nguyên Van Thuân acknowledged that "the whole of the Old Testament is directed toward hope: God is coming to restore his Kingdom, God is coming to re-establish the Covenant. God is coming to construct a new people, to build a new Jerusalem, to erect a new temple, to recreate the world. With the incarnation, this Kingdom arrived. But Jesus tells us that this Kingdom grows slowly, in a hidden way, like the mustard seed... Between the fullness of time and the end of times, the Church is on the road as the people of hope."

"Today, hope is perhaps the greatest challenge. Charles Peguy used to say: 'The faith I most like is hope.' Yes, because in hope, faith that operates through charity opens new paths in the heart of men, it tends to the realization of the new world, of the civilization love, that is nothing other than to lead the world to the divine life of the Trinity, in its way of being and operating, exactly as manifested in Christ and transmitted in the Gospel. This is our vocation. Today, as in the times of the Old and New Testament, he acts in the poor of spirit, in the humble, in sinners who convert to Him with all their heart."

After the Archbishop gave these points of meditation, the Pope and members of the Curia participating in the exercizes had time for private prayer over the themes presented.. ZE00031206

Tomorrow: GOD IS OUR ONLY CERTAINTY Christians Must Give World This Hope


March 29, 2000 volume 11, no. 63 LENTEN ON-LINE RETREAT To print out text of Today's issue, go to: SECTION ONE \| SECTION TWO		Search for anything from the last three years in past issues of the DailyCATHOLIC: