“We have all come here, to gather around the altar, from different cultures and traditions,” Marini, who heads the Pontifical Committee for International Eucharistic Congresses, said at the mass celebrated on Heroes’ Square.

The “dream of a church whose doors are open” has been realised, the cardinal said, making reference to the pope’s apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium.

The believers, after taking “the bread of life”, return to their homes, their schools, their offices, to heal others and lift them up with words of peace and acts of reconciliation, he added.

The cardinal said the Holy Spirit “gives us today again the courage to stand before the world in the way of Jesus”, who at the Last Supper demonstrated that “we must not reign, but serve; we do not belong to the rulers of this world, but are the children of God’s Kingdom”.

The salvation that comes from the eucharist, Marini said, becomes a “eucharistic culture”, capable of mobilising men and women of good will to reach out to the poor, work for peace, be stewards of the creation, be generous in ecumenical dialogues and share in difficulties.


MTI Photo: Noémi Bruzák