Pope Benedict XVI famous quotes

Only if there is love, if hearts are opened, can one person truly know the other.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #Heart

If you follow the will of God, you know that in spite of all the terrible things that happen to you, you will never lose a final refuge. You know that the foundation of the world is love, so that even when no human being can or will help you, you may go on, trusting in the One that loves you.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Love You #Catholic #Finals

Vacation time offers the unique opportunity to pause before the thought-provoking spectacles of nature, a wonderful "book" within reach of everyone, adults and children. In contact with nature, a person rediscovers his correct dimension, rediscovers himself as a creature, small but at the same time unique, with a "capacity for God" because interiorly he is open to the Infinite.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Children #Book

The world promises you comfort, but you were not made for comfort. You were made for greatness.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #Greatness

Dear young people, do not be satisfied with anything less than Truth and Love, do not be content with anything less than Christ
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#People #And Love #Christ

Do not believe that living together before marriage guarantees the future. By burning certain stages, you risk burning love itself. Time needs to be respected gradually, just like the expressions of love.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Believe #Expression #Risk

Do not be afraid of seeming different and being criticized for what might seem to be losing or out of fashion; your peers but adults too, especially those who seem more distant from the mindset and values of the Gospel, are crying out to see someone who dares to live according to the fullness of humanity revealed by Jesus Christ.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Fashion #Jesus #Humanity

Help each other to live and to grow in the Christian faith so as to be valiant witnesses of the Lord. Be united, but not closed. Be humble, but not fearful. Be simple, but not naive. Be thoughtful, but not complicated. Enter into dialogue with others, but be yourselves.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Christian #Humble #Thoughtful

The story of Mary of Magdalene reminds us all of a fundamental truth...A disciple of Christ is one who, in the experience of human weakness, has had the humility to ask for his help, has been healed by him and has set out following closely after him, becoming a witness of the power of his merciful love that is stronger than sin and death.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Humility #Stronger #Stories

It is the beautiful task of Advent to awaken in all of us memories of goodness and thus to open doors of hope.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Beautiful #Memories #Doors

An Adult faith does not follow the waves of fashion and the latest novelties.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Fashion #Novelty

Almsgiving, according to the Gospel, is not mere philanthropy; rather it is a concrete expression of charity, a theological virtue that demands interior conversion to love of God and neighbor, in imitation of Jesus Christ, who, dying on the cross, gave his entire self for us.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Jesus #Self #Expression

Truth is not determined by a majority vote.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Catholic #Majority #Determined

In a world where there is so much noise, so much bewilderment, there is a need for silent adoration of Jesus concealed in the Host. Be assiduous in the prayer of adoration and teach it to the faithful. It is a source of comfort and light, particularly to those who are suffering.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Jesus #Prayer #Light

Dear young people, the happiness you are seeking, the happiness you have a right to enjoy has a name and a face: it is Jesus of Nazareth, hidden in the Eucharist. Only he gives the fullness of life to humanity! With Mary, say your own "yes" to God, for he wishes to give himself to you.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Jesus #Names #People

May you always experience the joy that comes from putting Christ at the centre of your lives.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Joy #May #Christ

Being a Christian means having love. That is unbelievably difficult and, at the same time, incredibly simple.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Christian #Mean #Simple

Everything in this world will pass away. In eternity only Love will remain.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Passing Away #World #Eternity

The evangelization of the person and of human communities depends totally on this encounter with Jesus Christ.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Jesus #Community #Encounters

Dear friends, may no adversity paralyze you. Be afraid neither of the world, nor of the future, nor of your weakness. The Lord has allowed you to live in this moment of history so that, by your faith, his name will continue to resound throughout the world.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Adversity #Names #World

The environment is God's gift to everyone, and in our use of it we have a responsibility towards the poor, towards future generations, and towards humanity as a whole.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Responsibility #Humanity #Use

Anyone who has discovered Christ must lead others to him. A great joy cannot be kept to oneself. It has to be passed on.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Joy #Christ #Catholicism

Nature expresses a design of love and truth.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Life #Design #Truth And Love

Authentic love is obviously something good. When we love we become most fully human. But people often consider themselves loving when actually they are possessive or manipulative. People sometimes treat others as objects to satisfy their own needs. How easy it is to be deceived by the many voices in our society that advocate a permissive approach to sexuality, without regard for modesty, self-respect or the moral values that bring quality into human relationships! This is worship of a false god; instead of bringing life, it brings death.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Life #Love Is #Self

Dear brothers and sisters...The Lord is calling me to "climb the mountain", to devote myself even more to prayer and meditation. But this does not mean abandoning the Church, indeed, if God is asking me to do this, it is so I can continue to serve the Church with the same dedication and the same love with which I have done thus far, but in a way that is better suited to my age and my strength
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Brother #Prayer #Mean

The new pope knows that his task is to make the light of Christ shine before men and women of world - not his own light, but that of Christ.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Men #Light #Shining

To have Christian hope means to know about evil and yet to go to meet the future with confidence. The core of faith rests upon accepting being loved by God, and therefore to believe is to say Yes, not only to him, but to creation, to creatures, above all, to men, to try to see the image of God in each person and thereby to become a lover. That's not easy, but the basic Yes, the conviction that God has created men, that he stands behind them, that they aren't simply negative, gives love a reference point that enables it to ground hope on the basis of faith.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Christian #Believe #Mean

God is not solitude, but perfect communion. For this reason the human person, the image of God, realizes himself or herself in love, which is a sincere gift of self.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Self #Perfect #Solitude

Do not be afraid to say 'yes' to Jesus: to find your joy in doing His will
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Jesus #Joy

Dancing is not a form of expression for the Christian liturgy.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Christian #Expression #Dancing

If in my life I fail completely to heed others, solely out of a desire to be 'devout' and to perform my 'religious duties', then my relationship with God will also grow arid. It becomes merely 'proper', but loveless.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Religious #Desire #Failing

The human person finds his perfection "in seeking and loving what is true and good.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Perfection #Persons #Humans

We are not some casual and meaningless product of evolution. Each of us is the result of a thought of God.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Catholic #Evolution #Results

The relationship between individuals or communities and the environment ultimately stems from their relationship with God. When ‘man turns his back on the Creator’s plan, he provokes a disorder which has inevitable repercussions on the rest of the created order.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Men #Order #Community

God loves us; we need only to summon up the humility to allow ourselves to be loved.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #Humility

When human affairs are so ordered that there is no recognition of God, there is a belittling of man. That is why, in the final analysis, worship and law cannot be completely separated from each other. God has a right to a response from man, to man himself, and where that right of God totally disappears, the order of law among men is dissolved, because there is no cornerstone to keep the whole structure together.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Men #Order #Law

I, retired in prayer, will always be with you, and together we will move ahead with the Lord in certainty. The Lord is victorious.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Prayer #Moving #Together

During the season of Lent which begins today, we renew our commitment to the path of conversion, making more room for God in our lives.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Commitment #Path #Today

Following Jesus in faith is to walk with him in the communion of the Church. You cannot follow Jesus alone.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Jesus #Church #Communion

Do not be afraid of Christ! He takes nothing away, and he gives you everything.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Giving #Christ

There is no other possibility for possessing certitude with regard to one's life apart from self-abandonmen t, in a continuous crescendo, into the hands of a love that seems to grow constantly because it has its origin in God.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Self #Hands #Possibility

You have before you the task of seeking new ways to announce Christ in situations of rapid and often profound transformation, and of emphasizing the missionary character of all pastoral activity.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Character #Profound #Tasks

Mission is a duty about which one must say 'Woe to me if I do not evangelize' (1 Corinthians 9:16)...redemption and mission are acts of love [because] those who proclaim the Gospel participate in the charity of Christ.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Love Is #Redemption #Charity

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.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Expression #Giving #Joy

That the entire People of God, to whom Christ entrusted the mandate to go and preach the Gospel to every creature, may eagerly assume their own missionary responsibility and consider it the highest service they can offer humanity.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Responsibility #People #Humanity

We cannot keep to ourselves the words of eternal life given to us in our encounter with Jesus Christ: they are meant for everyone, for every man and woman. ... It is our responsibility to pass on what, by God's grace, we ourselves have received.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Jesus #Responsibility #Men

It is not by sidestepping or fleeing from suffering that we are healed, but rather by our capacity for accepting it, maturing through it and finding meaning through union with Christ, who suffered with infinite love.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Suffering #Fleeing #Unions

The closer a person is to God, the closer he is to people.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#People #Persons

Look at the face of the other... discover that he has a soul, a history and a life, that he is a person and that God loves this person.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Soul #Looks #Faces

Because the truth of God is love, conversion to God is conversion to love.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#God Is Love #Conversation

God of peace, bring your peace to our violent world: peace in the hearts of all men and women and peace among the nations of the Earth.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Heart #Men #World

I believe that the most important thing...is to revive in the whole Church that positive tension, that yearning to announce Christ again to contemporary man.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Believe #Men #Important

But Palm Sunday tells us that ... it is the cross that is the true tree of life.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Sunday #Tree #Crosses

We were looking for a 'good shepherd,' and instead we got a German shepherd.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Catholic #German Shepherds #Good Shepherd

If only everyone could experience the joy of being Christian, being loved by God Who gave His Son for us!
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Christian #Son #Joy

To me, it really seems visible today that ethics is not something exterior to the economy, which, as technical matter, could function on its own; rather, ethics is an interior principle of the economy itself, which cannot function if it does not take account of the human values of solidarity and reciprocal responsibility.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Responsibility #Doe #Matter

The real 'action' in the liturgy in which we are all supposed to participate is the action of God himself. This is what is new and distinctive about the Christian liturgy: God himself acts and does what is essential.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Christian #Real #Essentials

Preservation of the environment, promotion of sustainable development and particular attention to climate change are matters of grave concern for the entire human family.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Attention #Development #Matter

In a nuclear war there would be no victors, only victims. The truth of peace require that all-whether those governments which openly or secretly possess nuclear arms, or those planning to acquire them- agree to change their course by clear and firm decision and strive for a progressive and concerted nuclear disarmament. The resources which would be saved could then be employed in projects of development capable of benefiting all their people, especially the poor.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#War #Government #People

Advent, this powerful liturgical season that we are beginning, invites us to pause in silence to understand a presence. It is an invitation to understand that the individual events of the day are hints that God is giving us, signs of the attention he has for each one of us.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Powerful #Giving #Silence

Every human being is loved by God the Father. No one need feel forgotten, for every name is written in the Lord's loving heart.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Father #Heart #Names

Sometimes men and women prefer the darkness to the light because they are attached to their sins. Nevertheless it is only by opening oneself to the light and only by sincerely confessing one's sins to God that one finds true peace and true joy. It is therefore important to receive the Sacrament of Penance regularly, especially during Lent, in order to receive the Lord's forgiveness and to intensify our process of conversion.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Men #Light #Order

Purgatory basically means that God can put the pieces back together again. That He can cleanse us in such a way that we are able to be with Him and can stand there in the fullness of life. Purgatory strips off from one person what is unbearable and from another the inability to bear certain things, so that in each of them a pure heart is revealed, and we can see that we all belong together in one enormous symphony of being.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Mean #Heart #Symphony

The aim of all Christian education, moreover, is to train the believer in an adult faith that can make him a "new creation", capable of bearing witness in his surroundings to the Christian hope that inspires him.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Christian #Inspire #Adults

Having a clear faith, based on the creed of the church is often labeled today as fundamentalism. Whereas relativism, which is letting oneself be tossed and swept along by every wind of teaching, look like the only attitude acceptable to today's standards.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Attitude #Teaching #Wind

Today Christmas has become a commercial celebration, whose bright lights hide the mystery of God’s humility, which in turn calls us to humility and simplicity. Let us ask the Lord to help us see through the superficial glitter of this season, and to discover behind it the child in the stable in Bethlehem, so as to find true joy and true light.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Children #Humility #Light

Judas is neither a master of evil nor the figure of a demoniacal power of darkness but rather a sycophant who bows before the anonymous power of changing moods and current fashions. But it is precisely this anonymous power that crucified Jesus, for it was anonymous voices that cried 'away with him! Crucify him!'
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Fashion #Jesus #Voice

We must have great respect for these people who also suffer and who want to find their own way of correct living. On the other hand, to create a legal form of a kind of homosexual marriage, in reality, does not help these people.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Marriage #Reality #Hands

Seeing with the eyes of Christ, I can give to others much more than their outward necessities; I can give them the look of love which they crave.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Eye #Giving #Looks

Dear brothers and sisters, after the great Pope John Paul II, the cardinals have elected me - a simple, humble worker in the vineyard of the Lord.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Sister #Brother #Humble

This clash is an absurdity because on one hand there is much scientific proof in favor of evolution, which appears as a reality that we must see and which enriches our understanding of life and being as such.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Reality #Hands #Understanding

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

#Grace #Mercy #Power Of God

It is theologically and anthropologically important for woman to be at the center of Christianity. Through Mary, and the other holy women, the feminine element stands at the heart of the Christian religion.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Christian #Women #Heart

To desire the common good and strive towards it is a requirement of justice and charity.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Justice #Desire #Requirements

We live in a society in which it seems that every space, every moment must be 'filled' with initiatives, activity, sound; often there is not even time to listen and dialogue... Let us not be afraid to be silent outside and inside ourselves, so that we are able not only to perceive God's voice, but also the voice of the person next to us, the voices of others.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #Voice

The Gospel is not merely a communication of things that can be known - it is one that makes things happen and is life-changing. The dark door of time, of the future, has been thrown open. The one who has hope lives differently; the one who hopes has been granted the gift of a new life.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Life Changing #Communication

The discernment of a vocation is above all the fruit of an intimate dialogue between the Lord and his disciples. Young people, if they know how to pray, can be trusted to know what to do with God's call.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#People #Fruit #Praying

The extermination of millions of unborn children, in the name of the fight against poverty, actually constitutes the destruction of the poorest of all human beings.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Children #Fighting #Names

Mary's greatness consists in the fact that she wants to magnify God, not herself.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Greatness #Facts #Want

The "door of faith" (Acts 14:27) is always open for us, ushering us into the life of communion with God and offering entry into his Church. It is possible to cross that threshold when the word of God is proclaimed and the heart allows itself to be shaped by transforming grace. To enter through that door is to set out on a journey that lasts a lifetime.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #Heart

The ways of the Lord are not comfortable, but we were not created for comfort, but for greatness, for good.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Greatness #Way #Comfort

In silence, we are better able to listen to and understand ourselves; ideas come to birth and acquire depth... Deeper reflection helps us to discover the links between events that at first sight seem unconnected... For this to happen, it is necessary to develop an appropriate environment, a kind of 'eco-system' that maintains a just equilibrium between silence, words, images and sounds.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #Reflection

The deepest poverty is the inability of joy, the tediousness of a life considered absurd and contradictory. This poverty is widespread today, in very different forms in the materially rich as well as the poor countries. The inability of joy presupposes and produces the inability to love, produces jealousy, avarice - all defects that devastate the life of individuals and of the world. This is why we are in need of a new evangelization - if the art of living remains an unknown, nothing else works... this art can only be communicated by [one] who has life - he who is the Gospel personified.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Country #Art

The main task for us all is that of a new evangelization aimed at helping younger generations to rediscover the true face of God, who is Love. To you young people, who are in search of a firm hope, I address the very words that Saint Paul wrote to the persecuted Christians in Rome at that time: "May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit" (Rom 15:13).
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Christian #Believe #Rome

Ultimately, in the battle against lies and violence, truth and love have no other weapon than the witness of suffering.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Lying #Inspiration

God no longer simply stands before us as the One who is totally Other. He is within us, and we are in him. His dynamic enters into us and then seeks to spread outward to others until it fills the world, so that his love can truly become the dominant measure of the world.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #World

In the face of horror ... there is no other answer than the cross of Christ: Love that descends to the abyss of evil.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Evil #Answers #Faces

God came into the world to reawaken the thirst for great things in us.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #World

All the Saints of God are there to protect me, to sustain me and to carry me. And your prayers, my dear friends, your indulgence, your love, your faith and your hope accompany me.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Prayer #Love You #Saint

Receiving the Eucharist means adoring Him whom we receive. Only in this way do we become one with Him, and are given, as it were, a foretaste of the beauty of the heavenly liturgy. The act of adoration outside Mass prolongs and intensifies all that takes place during the liturgical celebration itself.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Mean #Catholic #Way

Silence 'is so lacking in this world which is often too noisy, which is not favorable to recollection and listening to the voice of God. In this time of preparation for Christmas, let us cultivate interior recollection so as to receive and keep Jesus in our lives.'
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Jesus #Voice #Silence

Society as a whole must defend the conceived child's right to life and the true good of the woman who can never, in any circumstances, find fulfilment in the decision to abort.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Children #Decision #Circumstances

If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful, and great. No! Only in this friendship are the doors of life opened wide. Only in this friendship is the great potential of human existence truly revealed.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Beautiful #Faith #Inspiration

Only from God does true revolution come... the definitive way to change the world.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #Way

To make the sign of the cross is to pronounce a visible and public yes to him who died for us and who is risen, to the God who in the humility and weakness of his love is omnipotent, stronger than all the power and intelligence of the world.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #Humility

Lent stimulates us to let the Word of God penetrate our life and in this way to know the fundamental truth: who we are, where we come from, where we must go, what path we must take in life...
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Inspiration #Who We Are

Faith in the resurrection of Jesus says that there is a future for every human being; the cry for unending life which is a part of the person is indeed answered... God exists: that is the real message of Easter. Anyone who even begins to grasp what this means also knows what it means to be redeemed.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Faith #Jesus #Easter

Every human life is precious in God's sight and no effort should be spared in the attempt to promote throughout the world a genuine respect for the inalienable rights and dignity of individuals and peoples everywhere.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Sight #Rights #Effort

Continue to walk in the faith and, faithful to the mandate that has been entrusted to you, go out with solicitude and joy toward all creatures and pass on to them the gifts of salvation...Let yourselves be guided by the Holy Spirit to be the leaven of new life, salt of the earth and light of the world.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Light #Joy #Faithful

I have a mustard seed; and I am not afraid to use it.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

#Catholic #Use #Mustard