Abortion is without a doubt one of the greatest moral evils within modernity. As the "Advocate of Christian Memory," a pope must take up the mantle of defending the culture of life - a defense the Early Church held against the pagans of Rome.

May every Church and Christian community be a place of mercy amid so much indifference.

I invite all Christians, everywhere, at this very moment, to a renewed personal encounter with Jesus Christ, or at least an openness to letting him encounter them.

When you lose the capacity to dream, you lose the capacity to love, and the energy to love is lost.

Almost without being aware of it, we end up being incapable of feeling compassion at the outcry of the poor, weeping for other people's pain, and feeling a need to help them, as though all this were someone else's responsibility and not our own.

God understands us, He waits for us. He doesn't get tired of forgiving us. If we repent and go to him with a truly open heart.

Vocations are born in prayer and from prayer; and only in prayer can they persevere and bear fruit.