Let us encourage one another in love for the Church.

Human life can be compared to a boat on the sea. We have to get on a ship to sail happily to the other shore, to the end of our life – to eternity. For us, such a boat is the Catholic Church, which we boarded in Holy Baptism. But are we in the right boat? The Gospel tells us that we are. Christ got into one of the boats that belonged to Simon and taught from it. We don’t think this was an accident! Let’s look at the circumstances under which Christ did this. Many people flocked after Him because they were eager for the Word of God. Not to be pushed into the water so that they might better understand Him, Jesus gets into Peter’s boat, and from this floating pulpit, He teaches. Today, this little boat of Peter is the Catholic Church. Christ teaches from it today as well.

We often witness the words, “Faith as faith. Religion is religion, for we all believe in one God. If this were true, Christ would not have chosen St. Peter’s boat but would have declared that people should believe whatever they want, and all will be well. But Christ never and nowhere said this. It is true that neither Peter himself nor those present immediately understood why Christ chose Peter’s boat. They understood it only afterward when He said to Peter: “You are Peter, and on this rock, I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. To you, I will give the keys of the kingdom of heaven” (Mt. 16:18-19). And later, he gave him this power by saying, “Feed my sheep!” (Jn. 21:15-17). Jesus directly appointed St. Peter as his church’s helmsman with these words. The Church can therefore save everyone who hears her voice, who lives in her, who accesses the sacraments in which Christ himself administers to us his grace necessary for salvation.

Among the many religions of the world, then, we must see the holy Church established by Christ Himself and that it is still headed by the immediate successor of St. Peter, the Pope. This is the mark of its authenticity, for Jesus, Himself, willed and ordained it.

Hence, the Council of Nicaea, as early as 325, declared, “To the bishop who resides in Rome belongs the honor of a patriarch because he is the successor of St. Peter, to whom Christ has given the supreme authority over the whole Church.” This is why Christ chose the same boat of St. Peter and taught from it, in order thus to testify to the authenticity of the Church, built on the rock which is Peter and his successor, the Pope. Holy Church is the Mother who offers every man to find true happiness through her. Throughout history and in our time, many erring people have found their lost meaning of life in the Church, in the truths of God, which she proclaims infallibly in Jesus, who lives in her.

Clemens Brentano, the eminent nineteenth-century poet, wrote to his niece: “When I had somewhat prematurely and wholly abandoned the Catholic way of life when I wandered without faith and purpose, and when I found myself in northern Germany, far from the Church, without rudder and mast, like the legendary Robinson of old, on the sands, I lay that night in great mental anguish, and I thought of the terrible path on which I had embarked to discover the new world. Again and again, I asked myself if there was even one point in the long line of years I had lived that I could lean upon, where I could seek refuge.

Then my childhood came to mind, and the way the fresh air woke me up when I opened my eyes and saw my mother sitting by my cot, bent over me, praying. Then she stretched out her hand and made a cross on my forehead. This childhood memory became a mainstay for me. I clung to it, and from it, I tried to come out into life. I struggled to piece together all the remnants of the forgotten prayers of my youth. And that saved me! That was the stalk I grabbed hold of at the last moment, for everything else had failed. I returned to the bosom of the Church in which I found my Mother.

Let us also allow the true joy of belonging to the holy Church to enter our hearts. Let us be active sons and daughters of her so we can truly live this joy. Let us consider her as our Mother and Teacher. We often see the Church being the target of all kinds of ridicule and attacks. We are rightly proud of the present successor of St. Peter, and yet many do not forgive themselves for various remarks and insults against him. Let us pray for the Holy Father! It has always mattered what this first man of the Church says. And in these times, at this moment, it is essential. After all, we don’t even need to do a great analysis of the whole issue. His work requires a lot of prayer from us. We believe he is in the love of God, God’s darling, as Peter was. How many times has he testified to this? But even though he is God’s darling, he still needs the support of our prayer.

Let us pray daily for the Holy Father. In this way, too, let us show that we love St. Peter’s Church so that by living actively in her as in a ship, we may sail to the shores of eternity.