The Holy Spirit gives us joy. And he is joy. Joy is the gift in which all the other gifts are included. It is the expression of happiness, of being in harmony with ourselves, that which can only come from being in harmony with God and with his creation. It belongs to the nature of joy to be radiant; it must communicate itself. The missionary spirit of the Church is none other than the impulse to communicate the joy which has been given.

The fundamental task of the evangelization of culture is the challenge to make God visible in the human face of Jesus.

When, as today, there is a market in human organs, when fetuses are produced to make spare organs available, or to make progress in research and preventive medicine, many regard the human content of these practices as implicit. But the contempt for man that underlies it, when man is used and abused, leads -- like it or not -- to a descent into hell.

Art means: revealing God in everything that exists.

Dialogue is the fundamental unfolding of a gift of oneself to another.

An authentic updating of sacred music can take place only in the lineage of the great tradition of the past, of Gregorian chant and of sacred polyphony.

We must trust in the mighty power of God's mercy. We are all sinners, but His grace transforms us and makes us new.