Our handicapped brothers and sisters who come on pilgrimage will not be able to appreciate all the riches of history and antiquity that Rome offers to the cultivated mind, even though experience shows they can grasp the meaning of the Catacombs, the Colosseum, the great basilicas far better than we might suppose. But they will be drawn to other things.
In the simplicity of their hearts, they will go straight to what matters: Rome is the Pope. Rome is the person of the present Pope. Rome is Paul VI.
Their hearts, often less burdened and less proud than ours, are more ready to grasp—with the intuition of love—the threefold mystery of the papacy.
- The Pope as "Supreme Pontiff." In the great solemnities of the Jubilee, he appears more than ever in this aspect, which many adults of our time risk viewing with indifference, distraction, or even hostility.
- The Pope as "Common Father" of the great Christian family. All the recent Popes, through their words and their gestures full of warmth, goodness, and gentleness, have known how to rekindle this figure in the hearts of their children.
But the Church of Jesus is not only a sacred Society, a Family united by Faith and Hope. It is also
- The "Mystical Body." For the Church Fathers, the papacy—like the Eucharist—is the great sign of the unity of love that is the first characteristic of God's Church: a mysterious sign, instituted by Jesus himself, as the visible and effective sign of the assistance of the Holy Spirit.
May our handicapped brothers and sisters, then, during their pilgrimage to Rome, be for us—and through us for all others—those sisters and brothers who help us see in the papacy the sign of the Unity of Love that so many Christians, an ever-growing number, are calling for.
Rome, July 1975