Friday, October 06, 2006

Pope's Wednesday General Audience: A catechesis on the Apostle Bartholomew

VATICAN - Pope Benedict XVI continues Audience catechesis on the Apostles: The figure of Saint Bartholomew is before us to say that we can live and bear witness as disciples of Jesus even without sensational deeds

Vatican City (Agenzia Fides) - On Wednesday morning October 4, Pope Benedict XVI returned to the Vatican after spending the Summer at Castel Gandolfo, and gave his customary general audience in St Peter’s square, where he was warmly welcomed by thousands of visitors. On his way to the square the Pope stopped to bless a new statue set in one of the niches on the outside of St Peter’s basilica. The statue represents Saint Genoveva Torres Morales, who founded the Congregation of the Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Holy Angels.

Continuing his catechesis on the Twelve Apostles, this week the Holy Father spoke about Bartholomew: “We have little information with regard to Bartholomew - the Pope said -; his name is found always but only in the lists of the Twelve, never at the centre of a narration. Traditionally however he is identified with Nathaniel, a name which means ‘God has given’. Nathaniel came from Cana and could have been a witness to a great ‘sign’ worked there by Jesus. The identification of these two figures is probably due to the fact that Nathaniel, in the scene of the calling as narrated in the Gospel of John, comes next to Philip, the place given to Bartholomew in the lists of the Apostles in the other three Gospels”.

The Pope recalled that when Philip said he had found “the one of whom Moses wrote in the Law and the Prophets: Jesus son of Joseph, from Nazareth”, Nathaniel replied: “Can anything good come from Nazareth?”. This statement tells us that “for the Jews, the Messiah would not come from such an unknown village as Nazareth” and at the same time, “underlines the freedom of God who surprises our expectations by letting Himself be found exactly there where we least expect Him ”.
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