In Naples, pope urges people to trust God will hear their prayers

-- Under grey skies and a cold rain, Pope Benedict XVI encouraged people to stand firm in their hope that God will hear their prayers for justice and peace. Arriving to celebrate Mass Oct. 21 in Naples' historic Piazza del Plebiscito, Pope Benedict stopped to embrace Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople, Anglican Archbishop Rowan Williams of Canterbury and other leaders of Christian churches.The religious leaders were in Naples for an Oct. 21-23 interreligious meeting sponsored by the Rome-based Sant'Egidio Community. After the Mass, they were joined by representatives of the Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, Hindu and other religions for a meeting and lunch with the pope.Patriarch Bartholomew, Archbishop Williams and Ezzedine Ibrahim, a Muslim scholar from the United Arab Emirates, were among the nine guests at the pope's table. Ibrahim was one of 138 Muslim leaders and scholars who signed an Oct. 11 letter to the pope and other Christian leaders proposing a dialogue based on the shared beliefs that there is only one God, that God loves the people he created and that he calls believers to love others.


"Pope Benedict said it is obvious that sometimes it seems prayers are not being answered, but people must have faith that if they persevere in prayer, God will intervene with justice.However, he said, "God cannot change things without our conversion, and our real conversion begins with the cry of the spirit that begs for forgiveness and salvation."To pray is not to ask God to do everything", he said, and it is not to withdraw from the world and wait until things improve. The pope ended his stay in Naples with a visit to the cathedral where the reliquary containing a vial of St. Januarius' dried blood is kept. Kneeling before the altar, the pope kissed the vial, but the miracle of the blood liquefying did not occur.Msgr. Vincenzo de Gregorio, custodian of the relic, told reporters that the blood, which often liquefies on the saint's feast day, has never liquefied when a pope visited on a day other than the feast day. The blood is said to liquefy three times a year -- on the Saturday before the first Sunday in May, the feast of the transfer of the saint's relics to Naples; Sept. 19, his feast day; and Dec. 16, the local feast commemorating the averting of a threatened eruption of Mount Vesuvius through the intervention of the saint.
By Cindy WoodenCatholic News ServiceNAPLES, Italy (CNS)