Concelebration at the Catholic University of Quebec (9 September 1984)

On Sunday, 9 September 1984, the Holy Father concelebrated Holy Mass at Catholic University "Laval" of Quebec. In his homily, the Pope spoke on the relation of Saint Peter's profession of faith in Christ at Caesarea Philippi and his own Apostolic visit to Canada.

1. “ You are the Christ, the Son of the living God! ” ( Matt . 16:16).

These words were first spoken in the vicinity of Caesarea Philippi, in response to Jesus' question: "Who do people say the Son of Man is?" ( Ibid . 16:13).

These words were spoken by Simon Peter in the land of Galilee. He spoke them later in many other places. He spoke them in Jerusalem, especially on the day of Pentecost. He spoke them in Antioch, when he left Jerusalem. He spoke them finally in Rome until the day when he had to suffer death on a cross to bear witness to the truth of these words. These words - professing the divine sonship of Jesus Christ - Simon Peter transmitted as an inheritance to the Church. He transmitted them in a particular way to all his successors in the episcopal see of Rome.

2. As Bishop of Rome, successor of Peter, I wish to pronounce these same words today on Canadian soil.

“You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” ( Matt . 16:16).

It is given to the Bishop of Rome to set foot on this land for the first time, in the city of Quebec. Here began the evangelization of Canada. Here the Church was founded. Here was the first diocese in all of North America. Here, through the seed sown in the earth, began an immense growth.

This is why I desire that, from the beginning of this pilgrimage, we meet and unite in this profession of faith on which the Church of Christ on earth is built:

Christ, the Son of man, the Son of the living God;

the Son, of the same nature as the Father: God, born of God, Light, born of Light; begotten, not created, eternal Word by whom all things were created;

and at the same time: Christ, true man.

“For us men, and for our salvation, he came down from heaven; by the Holy Spirit he took flesh of the Virgin Mary; and was made man.”

Christ: true God and true man. This is the faith of the Church.

Christ: crucified under Pontius Pilate, he died and was buried . . .

Christ: on the third day he rose from the dead, he ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father, from there he will come to judge the living and the dead.

3. This is the faith of the Apostles. This is the faith of Peter. This faith which is the foundation on which the Church of God on earth is built.

Simon Peter, who first professed this faith in the vicinity of Caesarea Philippi, was also the first to receive Christ's answer: "You are Cephas (that is, Peter), and on this rock I will build my Church . . ." ( Matt . 16:18).

How beautiful it is to hear the same Apostle, Simon Peter, in his first letter read in today's liturgy, bear witness to Christ by designating him as the foundation stone!

Christ is “the living stone” ( 1 Pet. 2:4).

This stone, in truth, “men have eliminated it” ( Ibid .) radically rejected, going so far as to condemn Jesus to death on the cross and carry out this sentence a few hours before Easter.

It is precisely in this rejection that He is recognized for what He is: Jesus, the Christ, the one “whom God has chosen because he knows his worth” ( Ibid .).

It is through Him, the living stone, the first stone, that we are all integrated into the construction of a “spiritual Temple” ( Ibid . 2, 5).

Yes, all of us “as living stones”; we are integrated into the building which has Christ as its foundation to build “a holy priesthood, presenting spiritual gifts which God will be able to accept for Christ Jesus’ sake” ( Ibid. ).

We are therefore "the chosen race, the royal priesthood, the holy nation, the people for God's own possession" ( Ibid . 2:9), and this through Jesus Christ who is the Son of the living God, who is true God and true Man, crucified and risen. Yes, through Jesus Christ: he is the first stone of the divine edifice, built with the sons and daughters of the whole earth, which will stand for eternity in the inexpressible Glory of the most holy Trinity!

From Jesus, the Christ, who is the living stone, opens this ultimate future of our construction... Such is the future of man on earth. The future of a divine destiny.

4. This then is the faith in Jesus Christ, which Simon Peter proclaimed!

This is the faith concerning the Church that Simon Peter proclaimed!

What a surprising unity! and what strength in this faith!

Today the Bishop of Rome, having come to Canadian soil, desires to profess this faith with all his heart. He desires to make it the foundation of his entire mission among you, beloved brothers and sisters, in this city of Quebec and throughout the Canadian land that I will then visit in each of its regions.

5. For we are here at the first home of the Church of Christ in North America. Having left France, Jacques Cartier, Champlain and so many others, by bringing their culture and language to this continent, contributed to implanting faith in Christ the Savior.

Many servants of God came, from the beginning of colonization, to build the edifice of the Church on your land. The Recollect Fathers, the Jesuits, the Sulpicians, the Ursulines with Marie de l’Incarnation radiating her incomparable spiritual experience, the Hospitallers of Dieppe led by the inexhaustible charity of Catherine of Saint-Augustin: these religious men and women were among the first to bear witness to the faith and love of Christ among the colonists and the “Indians”. Bearers of the Word, educators of the young, good Samaritans with the sick, they shaped the face of the Church in this new country. We could speak of a true “mystical epic” from the first half of the 17th century. Some gave their lives to the point of martyrdom. Many others joined them, bringing their living stone to the construction, often in poverty but made strong by the Spirit of God.

In this place, we particularly recall François de Montmorency Laval, apostolic vicar and then first bishop of Quebec. I cannot forget that the seminary that bears his name is at the origin of the University that welcomes us at this moment in this admirable site.

Your ancestors forged a culture here by drawing on the sources of their country of origin. Over the centuries, this heritage has taken root and diversified; it has welcomed the specific contribution of the Amerindians, and benefited from the English presence on this continent. It has been enriched by successive waves of immigrants from everywhere. Your people have been able to preserve their identity by remaining open to other cultures.

The Church has recognized or is preparing to recognize the holiness of a certain number of these pioneers. They are shining witnesses among many men and women, humble believers in everyday life, who have gradually shaped this land in their image, according to their faith.

The vitality and zeal of your predecessors have also led them to carry the Good News further: I salute here a Church that has quickly been able to shine in Western Canada, the Far North and in many regions of America. Moreover, it has played a large part in the missionary effort of the universal Church throughout the world.

Your motto is “I remember”. There are truly treasures in the memory of the Church as in the memory of a people!

But in each generation, living memory allows us to recognize the presence of Christ, who questions us as in the surroundings of Caesarea: “You, what do you say that I am?”

6. The answer to this question is crucial for the future of the Church in Canada, and also for the future of your culture.

You see that traditional culture - characterizing a certain "Christianity" - has broken up: it has opened up to a pluralism of schools of thought and must respond to multiple new questions; science, technology and the arts are taking on increasing importance; material values ​​are omnipresent; but also a greater sensitivity is emerging to promote human rights, peace, justice, equality, sharing, freedom...

In this changing society, your faith, dear Brothers and Sisters, will have to learn to express itself and to live itself. I said this to your bishops last October: “This time is the time of God who cannot fail to bring about what his Church needs when it remains available, courageous and prayerful”. You will know how to remember your past, the audacity and the fidelity of your predecessors, to bring in your turn the evangelical message to the heart of original situations. You will know how to bring about a new culture, to integrate the modernity of America without denying its profound humanity which undoubtedly came from the fact that your culture was nourished by Christianity. Do not accept the divorce between faith and culture. Now, it is to a new missionary approach that you are called.

7. Culture - and likewise education, which is the first and essential task of culture - is the fundamental search for the beautiful, the true, the good that best expresses man, as “the subject that bears the transcendence of the person” (Ioannis Pauli PP. II, Allocutio ad UNESCO habita , 10, die 2 iun. 1980: Insegnamenti di Giovanni Poalo II , III, 1 (1980) 1643), which helps him to become what he must “be” and not just to boast of what he “has” or “possesses”. Your culture is not only a reflection of what you are, but the crucible of what you will become. You will therefore develop your culture in a living and dynamic way in hope, without fear of difficult questions or new challenges; without allowing yourself to be deceived by the brilliance of novelty, and without allowing a void to set in, a discontinuity between the past and the future; in other words, with discernment and prudence, and with the courage of critical freedom with regard to what one might call the “cultural industry”; above all with the greatest concern for the truth.

But in addressing myself here to believers, I again repeat what I expressed at UNESCO: "I am thinking above all of the fundamental link between the Gospel, that is, the message of Christ and the Church, and man and his very humanity" ( Ibid .). Yes, dear brothers and sisters, in the culture that you are now developing, which is in line with what you already are by reason of a rich past, in this culture which is always the soul of a nation ( Ibid ., n. 14 : lc ., pp. 1647 f.), faith plays a great part. Faith will illuminate culture, it will give it savor, it will enhance it, as the Gospel says in regard to that "light", "salt" and "leaven" which the disciples of Jesus are called to be. Faith will ask culture what values ​​it promotes, what destiny it offers to life, what place it makes for the poor and the disabled with whom the Son of Man is identified, how it conceives of sharing, forgiveness and love. If it is this way, the Church will continue to accomplish its mission through you. And you will render service to all society, even to men and women who do not share the same spiritual experience as yourselves. For such a witness respects freedom of consciences, without thus abandoning them to certain "imperatives" of modern civilization which claim to serve human advancement but which in fact detract from respect for life, from the dignity of a love that involves persons, and from the search for the true values ​​of humanity (Ioannis Pauli PP. II, Allocutio ad UNESCO habita , 13, die 2 iun. 1980: Insegnamenti di Giovanni Paolo II , III, 1 (1980) 1646).

But again your faith must remain active and strong; it must become always more personal, more and more rooted in prayer and in the experience of the Sacraments; it must reach the living God, in his Son Jesus Christ the Savior, through the help of the Holy Spirit, in the Church. This is the faith that you ought to deepen with joy, in order to live it and to bear witness to it in daily life and in the new realms of culture. This is indeed the grace which we must request for the future of Quebec, for the future of all Canada. And here we are back to the fundamental question of Jesus Christ: "And you, who do you say that I am?". 

8. In the faith that Simon Peter affirmed in the vicinity of Caesarea Philippi, in the faith that he expressed so beautifully in his first letter, in this same faith, I, John Paul II, Bishop of Rome, wish to greet you cordially at the beginning of my pilgrimage to your land.

I would like to greet you all:

You who are the chosen race, the royal priesthood, the holy nation, the people for God's own possession;

You who have been called in Christ Jesus to “declare the wonders of him who has called you out of darkness into his marvelous light” ( 1 Pet. 2:9).

Today we are inaugurating a celebration destined to have a great impact on your hearts.

The Church puts on our lips the appropriate song:

“Sing to the Lord, blessing his name! / From day to day, proclaim his salvation, / tell of his glory to the nations / and his wonders to all peoples!” ( Ps. 96 (95), 2-3).

Let the Canadian land sing to the Lord / from the shores of the Atlantic to the shores of the Pacific, / and from the south to the frozen lands of the north . . .

Behold, Christ, the Son of the living God, has become the foundation stone among you!

Behold, Christ, the Son of the living God, has become the living stone for all generations!

Gloria Tibi, Trinity!

Glory to You, Holy Trinity!

Amen.

Dear Brothers and Sisters, I thank you for this moving welcome.

I first greet Monsignor Louis-Albert Vachon, Archbishop of Quebec, and each of my other Brothers in the Episcopate exercising their ministry in Canada.

I greet the representatives of other Churches who have come to join us from America and various continents, particularly from Europe, with which Canada has forged such strong ties.

I greet the Canadian missionaries and the representatives of the young Churches where they exercise their ministry.

I greet the Rector of Laval University, the professors and students and all those who work to renew and deepen culture to make it ever more human, in a trusting dialogue with faith.

I greet the priests, deacons, seminarians, religious men and women and lay people of the various parishes of this archdiocese and neighboring dioceses, who were able to come here thanks to the fraternal twinning of parishes.

I greet those for whom Jesus had particular concern: children, young people, the elderly, the sick, prisoners, all those who suffer from being unloved or marginalized, without work or in difficulty.

Together, following the Apostle Peter, let us turn to the Lord Jesus. May he strengthen our faith!

© Copyright 1984 - Libreria Editrice Vaticana

Copyright © Dicastero per la Comunicazione - Libreria Editrice Vaticana