are following, because deafness spreads.   
    "You may say to me, 'But these people were following the Master, they were   
   busy   
   listening to the words of the Master. They were intent on Him'. I think that   
   this is one of the most challenging things about Christian spirituality. The   
   Evangelist John tells us, 'How can you love God, Whom you do not see, if you do   
   not love your brother whom you do see?'. One of the great temptations we   
   encounter along the way, as we follow Jesus, is to separate these two things -   
   listening to God and listening to our brother - which belong together. We need   
   to be aware of this. The way we listen to God the Father is how we should   
   listen   
   to His faithful people. To pass by, without hearing the pain of our people,   
   without sinking roots in their lives and in their world, is like listening to   
   the word of God without letting it take root and bear fruit in our hearts. Like   
   a tree, a life without roots is a one which withers and dies".   
    The second response to Bartimaeus' cry was to tell him to keep quiet. "Be   
   quiet, don't bother us, don't disturb us, we who are engaged in community   
   prayer, we who have attained a high level of spirituality. Do not bother us, do   
   not disturb. Unlike the first response, this one hears, acknowledges, and makes   
   contact with the cry of another person. It recognises that he or she is there,   
   but reacts simply by scolding. There are bishops, priests, nuns, Popes, who wag   
   their finger like this. ... And the poor faithful people of God, how often they   
   are affected by the bad mood or the personal situation of one of Jesus'   
   followers. It is the attitude of some leaders of God's people; they continually   
   scold others, hurl reproaches at them, tell them to be quiet. 'Madam, take your   
   crying child out of the church while I am preaching'. As if the cry of a child   
   were not a sublime form of sermon'.   
    This is the drama of the isolated consciousness, of those disciples who think   
   that the life of Jesus is only for those deserve it. At its basis there is a   
   profound disdain for the holy faithful people of God. They seem to believe   
   there   
   is only room for the 'worthy', for the 'better people', and little by little   
   they separate and differentiate themselves from the others. They have made   
   their   
   identity a badge of superiority. They are not pastors, but foremen: 'I am here,   
   now get into your place'. They hear, but they don't listen. The need to show   
   that they are different has closed their heart. Their need to tell themselves,   
   'I am not like that person, like those people', not only cuts them off from the   
   cry of their people, from their tears, but most of all from their reasons for   
   rejoicing. Laughing with those who laugh, weeping with those who weep; all this   
   is part of the mystery of a priestly heart".   
    Thirdly, they told him to take heart and get up. "It is not so much a direct   
   response to the cry of Bartimaeus as an echo, or a reflection, of the way Jesus   
   Himself responded to the pleading of the blind beggar. In those who told him to   
   take heart and get up, the beggar's cry issued in a word, an invitation, a new   
   and changed way of responding to God's holy People. Unlike those who simply   
   passed by, the Gospel says that Jesus stopped and asked what was happening. He   
   stopped when someone cried out to Him. Jesus singled him out from the nameless   
   crowd and got involved in his life. And far from ordering him to keep quiet, He   
   asked him, 'What do you want me to do for you?'. He didn't have to show that He   
   was different, somehow apart; He didn't decide whether Bartimaeus was worthy or   
   not before speaking to him. He simply asked him a question, looked at him and   
   sought to come into his life, to share his lot. And by doing this He gradually   
   restored the man's lost dignity; He included him. Far from looking down on him,   
   Jesus was moved to identify with the man's problems and thus to show the   
   transforming power of mercy. There can be no compassion without stopping,   
   hearing and showing solidarity with the other. Compassion is not about zapping,   
   it is not about silencing pain, it is about the logic of love. A logic, a way   
   of   
   thinking and feeling, which is not grounded in fear but in the freedom born of   
   love and of desire to put the good of others before all else. A logic born of   
   not being afraid to draw near to the pain of our people. Even if often this   
   means no more than standing at their side and praying with them.   
    "This is the logic of discipleship, it is what the Holy Spirit does with us   
   and   
   in us", emphasised the Pope. "We are witnesses of this. One day Jesus saw us on   
   the side of the road, wallowing in our own pain and misery, in our   
   indifference.   
   He did not close his ear to our cries. He stopped, drew near and asked what He   
   could do for us. And thanks to many witnesses, who told us, 'Take heart; get   
   up', gradually we experienced this merciful love, this transforming love, which   
   enabled us to see the light. We are witnesses not of an ideology, of a recipe,   
   of a particular theology. We are witnesses to the healing and merciful love of   
   Jesus. We are witnesses of His working in the lives of our communities. This is   
   the pedagogy of the Master, this is the pedagogy which God uses with His   
   people.   
   It leads us to passing from distracted zapping to the point where we can say to   
   others: 'Take heart; get up. The Master is calling you'. Not so that we can be   
   special, not so that we can be better than others, not so that we can be God's   
   functionaries, but only because we are grateful witnesses to the mercy which   
   changed us. ... And when you live in this way, there is joy and good cheer.   
    "On this journey we are not alone. We help one another by our example and by   
   our prayers. We are surrounded by a cloud of witnesses. Let us think of Blessed   
   Nazaria Ignacia de Santa Teresa de Jesus, who dedicated her life to the   
   proclamation of God's Kingdom through her care for the aged, her 'kettle of the   
   poor' for the hungry, her homes for orphaned children, her hospitals for   
   wounded   
   soldiers and her creation of a women's trade union to promote the welfare of   
   women. Let us also think of Venerable Virginia Blanco Tardio, who was   
   completely   
   dedicated to the evangelisation and care of the poor and the sick".   
    "These women, and so many other persons like them - anonymous, many of them -   
   who follow Jesus, are an encouragement to us along our way", exclaimed the   
   bishop of Rome. "May we press forward with the help and cooperation of all. For   
   the Lord wants to use us to make his light reach to every corner of our world".   
      
   ___________________________________________________________   
      
    To popular movements: the universal destination of goods is not a figure of   
   speech in the Church's social teaching   
    Vatican City, 10 July 2015 (VIS) - The Pope's day in Santa Cruz de la Sierra   
   concluded with his participation in the Second World Meeting of Popular   
   Movements, organised in collaboration with the Pontifical Council "Justice and   
   Peace" and the Pontifical Academy for Social Sciences, attended by delegates   
   from popular movements from all over the world representing workers in   
   precarious employment and the informal economy, landless farmers, "villeros"   
   (inhabitants of poor areas), indigenous peoples, immigrants, and social   
   movements.   
    Also present were Cardinal Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson, president of "Justice   
   and Peace", and Bishop Marcelo Sanchez Sorondo, chancellor of the Pontifical   
   Academy. The first meeting took place in the Vatican in October 2014, and was   
   attended by the president of Bolivia, Evo Morales, who yesterday also presented   
   a discourse in the Expo Feria centre, hosting the event in which three thousand   
   people have participated.   
    The following is the full text of the discourse given by Pope Francis:   
    "Good afternoon! Several months ago, we met in Rome, and I remember that first   
   meeting. In the meantime I have kept you in my thoughts and prayers. I am happy   
   to see you again, here, as you discuss the best ways to overcome the grave   
   situations of injustice experienced by the excluded throughout our world. Thank   
   you, President Evo Morales, for your efforts to make this meeting possible.   
   During our first meeting in Rome, I sensed something very beautiful:   
   fraternity,   
   determination, commitment, a thirst for justice. Today, in Santa Cruz de la   
   Sierra, I sense it once again. I thank you for that. I also know, from the   
   Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace headed by Cardinal Turkson, that many   
   people in the Church feel very close to the popular movements. That makes me   
   very happy! I am pleased to see the Church opening her doors to all of you,   
   embracing you, accompanying you and establishing in each diocese, in every   
   justice and peace commission, a genuine, ongoing and serious cooperation with   
   popular movements. I ask everyone, bishops, priests and laity, as well as the   
   social organisations of the urban and rural peripheries, to deepen this   
   encounter.   
    "Today God has granted that we meet again. The Bible tells us that God hears   
   the cry of his people, and I wish to join my voice to yours in calling for   
   land,   
   lodging and labour for all our brothers and sisters. I said it and I repeat it:   
   these are sacred rights. It is important, it is well worth fighting for them.   
   May the cry of the excluded be heard in Latin America and throughout the world.   
    "Let us begin by acknowledging that change is needed. Here I would clarify,   
   lest there be any misunderstanding, that I am speaking about problems common to   
   all Latin Americans and, more generally, to humanity as a whole. They are   
   global   
   problems which today no one state can resolve on its own. With this   
   clarification, I now propose that we ask the following questions.   
    "Do we realise that something is wrong in a world where there are so many   
   farmworkers without land, so many families without a home, so many labourers   
   without rights, so many persons whose dignity is not respected? Do we realise   
   that something is wrong where so many senseless wars are being fought and acts   
   of fratricidal violence are taking place on our very doorstep? Do we realise   
   something is wrong when the soil, water, air and living creatures of our world   
   are under constant threat? So let's not be afraid to say it: we need change; we   
   want change.   
    "In your letters and in our meetings, you have mentioned the many forms of   
   exclusion and injustice which you experience in the workplace, in   
   neighbourhoods   
   and throughout the land. They are many and diverse, just as many and diverse   
   are   
   the ways in which you confront them. Yet there is an invisible thread joining   
   every one of those forms of exclusion: can we recognise it? These are not   
   isolated issues. I wonder whether we can see that these destructive realities   
   are part of a system which has become global. Do we realise that that system   
   has   
   imposed the mentality of profit at any price, with no concern for social   
   exclusion or the destruction of nature?   
    "If such is the case, I would insist, let us not be afraid to say it: we want   
   change, real change, structural change. This system is by now intolerable:   
   farmworkers find it intolerable, labourers find it intolerable, communities   
   find   
   it intolerable, peoples find it intolerable ... The earth itself - our sister,   
   Mother Earth, as St. Francis would say - also finds it intolerable. We want   
   change in our lives, in our neighbourhoods, in our everyday reality. We want a   
   change which can affect the entire world, since global interdependence calls   
   for   
   global answers to local problems. The globalisation of hope, a hope which   
   springs up from peoples and takes root among the poor, must replace the   
   globalisation of exclusion and indifference.   
    "Today I wish to reflect with you on the change we want and need. You know   
   that   
   recently I wrote about the problems of climate change. But now I would like to   
   speak of change in another sense. Positive change, a change which is good for   
   us, a change - we can say - which is redemptive. Because we need it. I know   
   that   
   you are looking for change, and not just you alone: in my different meetings,   
   in   
   my different travels, I have sensed an expectation, a longing, a yearning for   
   change, in people throughout the world. Even within that ever smaller minority   
   which believes that the present system is beneficial, there is a widespread   
   sense of dissatisfaction and even despondency. Many people are hoping for a   
   change capable of releasing them from the bondage of individualism and the   
      
   --- MPost/386 v1.21   
    * Origin: Sursum Corda! BBS=Huntsville AL=bbs.sursum-corda.com (1:396/45)