Everyone can be as holy as the Popes who will be canonized this Sunday, Rome’s vocation’s director has stressed.
Don Fabio Rosini said that all can be just as holy as they were, if they answer God’s call of mercy by responding to God in love.
He was speaking at a meeting with young people that took place at the papal archbasilica of St. John Lateran. Cardinal Agostino Vallini, vicar of Rome, presided.
Father Manuel Dorantes, official at the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, told ZENIT that the message of the event was “right on.”
“I was very taken aback specifically by Don Fabio who basically reminded our young people, the young people of Rome, that the life of John Paul II, as important as it is, is not more important than yours. … We all are called to holiness.”
“The call to holiness is not for an exclusive club of people, but rather it is a universal call to which all of us are meant to respond,” he added.
Prior to Don Fabio’s catechesis, Father Giovangiuseppe Califano and Monsignor Slawomir Oder, postulators for the causes of Blessed John XXIII and John Paul II, respectively, gave personal testimonies.
Pilgrims attending enjoyed the personal recollections provided by Monsignor Oder’s discourse, especially relating to John Paul II’s sense of humor.
For young people to hear “today, that their lives are important, their lives matter, and are as important as those of John Paul II or John XXIII,” is significant, Father Dorantes said.
Jane Skjoldli, a Norwegian pilgrim, added that the meeting made the love of these two Popes so “tangible,” so “palpable.”
