The banners of Carlo Acutis and Pier Giorgio Frassati They are already positioned on the facade of the Basilica of San Pietro where the canonization ceremony chaired by Leo XIV.
There is an atmosphere of celebration in San Pietro square For the jubilee hearing where many devotees of the two young saints arrived.
The Pope arrives half an hour before the beginning and on board the Papamobile greets the faithful and blesses the children who are approached. And the catechesis of the pontiff who invites us to take example from them so as not to lay on the things achieved but to continue to continue to dig. “I would like to start with a memory: as children, putting his hands in the earth had a special charm. We remember it, and perhaps we still observe it: It is good for us to observe the game of children! Dig into the earth, break the hard crust of the world and see what is underneath … “said the Pope.”We can lay ourselves in the positions reached and in the wealth, more or less large, which give us security. Thus we lose the joy we had as children, That desire to dig and invent that makes new every day ».
The theme of catechesis is precisely “digging and hoping” in which the pontiff deepens the figure of the empress Elena, mother of Constantine and comments on the song of the Gospel of Matteo who tells the discovery of the treasure in the field: “What Jesus describes in this parable is no longer a game of children, yet the joy of surprise is the same”, underlines the Pontiff, ” of God. On the contrary: so there is the kingdom of God. Hope is rekindled when we dig and break the crust of reality, let’s go below the surface».
“Today,” added the Pope, “I would like to remember with you that, as soon as the freedom to live by Christians publicly, the disciples of Jesus began to dig, in particular in the places of his passion, death and resurrection. The tradition of the East and West recalls Flavia Giulia Elena, mother of Emperor Constantine, like the soul of those research. A woman looking for. A woman who digs. The treasure that turns on hope is in fact the life of Jesus: it must be put on his traces. How many other things could have done an empress! What noble places could have preferred to the peripheral Jerusalem. How many pleasures and honors of the court. We too, sisters and brothers “, added the Pope,” we can lay ourselves in the positions achieved and in the wealth, more or less large, which give us security. Thus we lose the joy we had as children, that desire to dig and invent that makes new every day. “Invent” – you know – in Latin means “finding”. Elena’s great “invention” was the discovery of the Holy Cross. Here is the hidden treasure for selling everything! The cross of Jesus is the greatest discovery of life, the value that changes all the values».
And the Pontiff, underlining the figure of Elena, explains that “so much dignity and loyalty to consciousness change the world even today: They approach the treasure, like the work of the agricultor. Cultivating your heart requires effort. It is the greatest job. But digging he finds himself, lowering himself we get closer to that Lord that led himself to himself to do like us“He added,” his cross is under the crust of our land. We can walk proudly, abstractly trampling the treasure that is under our feet. If, on the other hand, we become as children, we will get to know another kingdom, another force. God is always below us, to get up high ».