Pope Francis: Benedict XVI brought us to ‘encounter with Jesus’

Benedict XVI “always wanted to accompany us in the encounter with Jesus,” Pope Francis said at the start of his weekly public audience on Wednesday.

The pope began his message Jan. 4 with a reference to his predecessor, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, who died on Dec. 31 at the age of 95. The body of Benedict XVI is lying in state in St. Peter’s Basilica Jan. 2-4, before his funeral on Jan. 5.

“Before beginning this catechesis,” Francis said in the Vatican’s Paul VI Hall, “I would like us to join with those here beside us who are paying their respects to Benedict XVI, and to turn my thoughts to him, a great master of catechesis.”

Catechesis means religious instruction or teaching.

“His acute and gentle thought was not self-referential, but ecclesial, because he always wanted to accompany us in the encounter with Jesus,” he said.

“Jesus, Crucified and Risen, the Living One and the Lord, was the destination to which Pope Benedict led us, taking us by the hand,” the pope added. “May he help us rediscover in Christ the joy of believing and the hope of living.”

Pope Francis’ message on Wednesday was the final instruction in a series on the theme of discernment.

One of the important tools to support discernment, he said, is spiritual accompaniment, also called spiritual direction.

“It’s very important not to walk alone,” he underlined, encouraging Catholics to find a spiritual director, a lay person or a priest, who can help to “unmask misunderstandings, even grave ones, in our consideration of ourselves and our relationship with the Lord.”

The pope compared the experience of discernment without accompaniment to looking at yourself alone in a mirror: you can imagine things that are not there or see things in a distorted way.

“God’s grace in us always works on our nature. Thinking of a Gospel parable, we can always compare grace to the good seed and nature to the soil,” Francis said. “First of all, it is important to make ourselves known, without fear of sharing the most fragile aspects, where we find ourselves to be more sensitive, weak, or afraid of being judged.”

He emphasized that the person who accompanies us in our spiritual journey does not replace or substitute the Lord, but “walks alongside him or her, encouraging them to interpret what is stirring in their heart, the quintessential place where the Lord speaks.”