Pope Francis: The path to holiness requires a spiritual battle

Pope Francis said on Sunday that Christian life requires concrete commitments and spiritual combat to grow in holiness.

“There is no path to holiness without some renunciation and without spiritual combat,” Pope Francis said in his address to the Angelus on 27 September.

This battle for personal holiness requires grace "to fight for good, to fight not to fall into temptation, to do what we can on our part, to come and live in the peace and joy of the Beatitudes," added the pope .

In the Catholic tradition, spiritual combat involves an internal "battle of prayer" in which a Christian must fight temptation, distraction, discouragement or dryness. Spiritual warfare also involves cultivating virtue to make better life choices and exercise charity towards others.

The pope recognized that conversion can be a painful process because it is a process of moral purification, which he compared to the removal of encrustations from the heart.

“Conversion is a grace for which we must always ask: 'Lord, give me the grace to improve. Give me the grace to be a good Christian '”, said Pope Francis from the window of the Vatican Apostolic Palace.

Reflecting on Sunday's Gospel, the Pope said that "living a Christian life is not made up of dreams or beautiful aspirations, but of concrete commitments, in order to open ourselves more and more to God's will and love for our brothers".

“Faith in God asks us to renew every day the choice of good over evil, the choice of truth rather than lies, the choice of love for our neighbor over selfishness,” Pope Francis said.

The pope pointed to one of Jesus' parables in chapter 21 of the Gospel of Matthew in which a father asks two sons to go and work in his vineyard.

“At the invitation of the father to go to work in the vineyard, the first son replies impulsively 'no, no, I'm not going', but then he repents and leaves; instead the second child, who immediately replies “yes, yes father”, doesn't actually do it, ”he said.

"Obedience does not consist in saying 'yes' or 'no', but in acting, in cultivating the vineyard, in realizing the Kingdom of God, in doing good".

Pope Francis explained that Jesus used this parable to call people to understand that religion should influence their lives and attitudes.

"With his preaching on the Kingdom of God, Jesus opposes a religiosity that does not involve human life, that does not question conscience and its responsibility in the face of good and evil," he said. “Jesus wants to go beyond a religion understood only as an external and habitual practice, which does not affect people's lives and attitudes”.

While acknowledging that the Christian life requires conversion, Pope Francis stressed that "God is patient with each of us".

“He [God] does not tire, does not give up after our 'no'; He also leaves us free to distance ourselves from him and make mistakes… But he anxiously awaits our "yes", to welcome us again into his fatherly arms and fill us with his limitless mercy, "said the pope.

After reciting the Angelus with pilgrims gathered under umbrellas in a rainy St. Peter's Square, the pope asked people to pray for peace in the Caucasus region, where Russia has organized joint military exercises with China, Belarus, Iran. , Myanmar, Pakistan and Armenia last week.

"I ask the parties to the conflict to make concrete gestures of good will and brotherhood, which can lead to solving problems not with the use of force and weapons, but through dialogue and negotiation," said Pope Francis.

Pope Francis also greeted the migrants and refugees attending the Angelus as the Church celebrates World Migrant and Refugee Day and said he was praying for small businesses affected by the coronavirus pandemic.

“May Holy Mary help us to be docile to the action of the Holy Spirit. It is He who melts the hardness of hearts and disposes them to repent, so we can obtain the life and salvation promised by Jesus, ”the pope said.