Our Lady of Perpetual Help

Be eager to present yourself as acceptable to God, a workman who causes no disgrace, imparting the word of truth without deviation. — St. Timothy

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Rome, Italy, Jan 25, 2021 / 12:19 pm (CNA).- Papal almoner Cardinal Konrad Krajewski offered a funeral Mass Monday for a 64-year-old homeless man who died in Rome.

Roberto Mantovani died in a homeless shelter near Rome’s Termini train station after contracting pneumonia.

Cardinal George Pell concelebrated the funeral Mass Jan. 25 at the parish of St. Pius X with Archbishop Arthur Roche, Secretary of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, and a dozen priests, according to Vatican News.

Cardinal Krajewski, who knew Mantovani, said that he chose the reading from the Gospel of Luke in which Christ recounts the parable of Lazarus and the rich man, for the funeral Mass because "Robert always slept in front of a closed door."

"He was a cheerful, sunny person, at the lunches we had he made everyone laugh," Cardinal Krajewski said.

Mantovani will be buried next to his parents in his hometown of Oppeano in northern Italy. He had formerly been a professional soccer player with Hellas Verona F.C. but an injury ended his career.

His funeral took place one day after Pope Francis prayed for another homeless man, a 46-year-old Nigerian man named Edwin, who was found dead near St. Peter’s Square last week.

“Last Jan. 20, a few meters from St. Peter’s Square, a 46-year-old Nigerian homeless man named Edwin was found dead because of the cold,” the pope said Jan. 24.

“His story was added to that of many other homeless people who recently died in Rome in the same dramatic circumstances. Let us pray for Edwin.”

According to the news website RomaToday, Edwin was the fourth homeless person to die this year in Rome, where there are an estimated 8,000 homeless people. Many sleep in tents along the edge of Bernini’s colonnade, the semi-circular columns enclosing St. Peter’s Square.

“Let us think about Edwin,” Pope Francis said. “Let us think of how this man, 46 years old, felt in the cold, ignored by all, abandoned, even by us. Let us pray for him.”

Rome, Italy, Jan 25, 2021 / 11:39 am (CNA).- The Week of Prayer for Christian Unity concluded Monday with Vespers at the tomb of St. Paul.

Pope Francis was unable to attend the evening prayer Jan. 25 at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls due to a resurgence of sciatic nerve pain, but the pope’s prepared homily for the occasion was read by Cardinal Kurt Koch, the president of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity.

“Dear brothers and sisters, may we remain united in Christ. May the Holy Spirit, poured into our hearts, make us feel like children of the Father, brothers and sisters of one another, brothers and sisters in our one human family. May the Holy Trinity, communion of love, make us grow in unity,” Koch said.

On the feast of the conversion of St. Paul, the cardinal venerated St. Paul’s relics alongside the vicar archbishop of the Romanian Orthodox diocese of Italy, Atanasie Rusnac, and Anglican Archbishop Ian Ernest, the director of the Anglican Centre in Rome.

The Church dedicates one week each January to prayer for unity among all Christians. The theme of this year’s Week of Prayer for Christian Unity was “abide in my love and you shall bear much fruit.”

In his prepared homily, the pope wrote that “we can grow and bear fruit only if we remain united to Jesus.”

“In today’s fast-paced and complex world, it is easy to lose our compass,  pulled as we are from every side. Many people feel internally fragmented, unable to find a fixed point, a stable footing, amid life’s changes. Jesus tells us that the secret of stability is to abide in him,” Cardinal Koch read.

“Jesus also showed us how to abide in him. He left us his  own example: each day he withdrew to pray in deserted places. We need prayer, as we need water,  to live. Personal prayer, spending time with Jesus, adoration, these are essential if we are to abide  in him. In this way, we can place our worries, hopes and fears, joys and sorrows in the Lord’s  heart. Most of all, centred on Jesus in prayer, we can experience his love.”
Pope Francis’ homily stated that the Holy Spirit desires to restore unity and inspires “gratuitousness, to love even those who do not love us in return.”

He wrote: “The Spirit blows where he wills, and everywhere he wants to restore unity. He impels us  to love not only those who love us and think as we do, but to love everyone, even as Jesus taught  us.”

“He enables us to forgive our enemies and the wrongs we have endured. He inspires us to be  active and creative in love. He reminds us that our neighbors are not only those who share our  own values and ideas, and that we are called to be neighbours to all, good Samaritans to a humanity that is frail, poor and, in our own time, suffering so greatly.”

Pope Francis asked all Christians to pray for “the gift of unity” during his general audience livestream last Wednesday.

“During this time of serious hardship, this prayer is even more necessary so that unity might prevail over conflicts. It is urgent that we set aside preferences to promote the common good, and so our good example is fundamental: it is essential that Christians pursue the path toward full visible unity,” the pope said Jan. 20.

“The world will not believe because we will have convinced it with good arguments, but because we will have borne witness to that love that unites us and draws us near to everyone,” he said.