Benedict XVI Talks Prayer to Priests

CASTEL GANDOLFO, Italy, AUG. 31, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Prayer is not an extra activity in a priest's life, but an essential duty, says Benedict XVI. The Holy Father said this today in an impromptu question and answer session with priests from the Diocese of Albano, Italy. The hour-and-a-half long discussion touched on the difficulties that priests face in daily life, the liturgy, family and youth, reported Vatican Radio. Castel Gandolfo, where the Holy Father is spending the rest of the summer, belongs to the Diocese of Albano. Bishop Marcello Semeraro of Albano gave a welcoming address to Benedict XVI, and then the priests asked the Bishop of Rome five questions. Responding to the first question on the situation of the Church, posed by an 83-year-old priest, the Pope said that they should not to allow themselves to be discouraged. He stressed that the Church is alive. The Holy Father mentioned some examples of great threats that the Church faced in the past, such as the Muslim invasions, the Enlightenment, Marxism, and Hitler, who said that he was convinced "that he would finally be able to destroy Catholicism." "We have 2,000 years of Church history, with so many sufferings, including many failures," the Bishop of Rome said, but "on the other hand we see how the Church has revived after so many crises with a new youth, with new freshness." In particular, Benedict XVI referred to the flourishing vocations in Africa, saying they are a significant and concrete hope. In the second question, the Pope addressed the need for evangelization, stressing responsibility in preparation for the sacraments, particularly marriage, as well as pastoral care of the divorced who have remarried. In this evangelizing work, the Holy Father also emphasized the importance of the charity dedicated to the suffering, the sick, the marginalized and the poor. Liturgy The third question had to do with liturgy. Benedict XVI insisted on the importance of dialogue with God, personal encounter with Christ, listening to and proclaiming the word. "I think the faithful realize if we are really in dialogue with God ... or if we only do something exterior," as if it were theater, said the Pope. Speaking on the family, the Holy Father recalled the 5th World Meeting of Families in Valencia, Spain, in July. The Pontiff pointed out the importance of the testimony of Christian families, also those that surmount daily difficulties -- great and little, adding that priests can also grow in maturity by learning from the sufferings of married people. The last question was on the pastoral care of young people. Benedict XVI emphasized the need to keep alive the enthusiasm of the World Youth Days, cultivating and stimulating -- with the bishops' guidance -- the important activities of volunteer workers, movements, groups of prayer and contemplation of the Word, as "God continues to speak to the men of today." The most insistent advice the Pope gave to priests was prayer: "It is not a time that is taken away from our pastoral responsibility, as it is precisely pastoral work to pray, to pray also for others … substituting others who perhaps do not know how to pray, who do not want to pray, or who do not find time to pray."