Friday, July 4, 2008

St Paul's world - not so different to ours


St Paul preaching in Athens (Raphael)

At his General Audience in Rome two days ago, Pope Benedict XVI began a new series of talks on the person and teaching of St. Paul. This first one deals with the historical background to St Paul.

"The Apostle Paul, an exceptional and virtually inimitable yet stimulating figure, is before us as an example of total dedication to the Lord and his Church, as well as of great openness to humanity and its cultures. It is just, therefore, that we reserve a particular place for him, not only in our veneration, but also in an effort to understand what he has to say to us, Christians of today, as well.

"In this, our first meeting, I would like to pause to consider the environment in which he lived and worked. Such a topic would seem to take us far from our time, given that we must insert ourselves in the world of 2,000 years ago. And yet, this is only apparently and partly true, because it can be verified that in many ways, the socio-cultural environment of today is not so different than that of back then.

For the rest of Pope Benedict's address, go HERE.


0 comments:

Post a Comment