‘If God can visit us, even when our hearts seem like a lowly manger, we can truly say: Hope is not dead; hope is alive and it embraces our lives forever!’

On the Solemnity of the Epiphany, Pope Francis reminds us that "contemplating God is beautiful, but it is only fruitful if we take a risk, the risk of the service of bringing God to others."

Pope Francis preaches on Jesus’ love and desires for us at the Way of the Cross at World Youth Day.

This is what the Pasch of the Lord accomplishes: it motivates us to move forward, to leave behind our sense of defeat, to roll away the stone of the tombs in which we often imprison our hope, and to look with confidence to the future.

“Christ, in his abandonment, stirs us to seek him and to love him and those who are themselves abandoned. For in them we see not only people in need, but Jesus himself, abandoned.”

“The rite of the imposition of ashes serves as the beginning of this return journey. It exhorts us to do two things: to return to the truth about ourselves and to return to God and to our brothers and sisters.”