Angelus - 6 February 2005

JOHN PAUL II

ANGELUS

Sunday, 6 February 2005

1. Today, I am speaking to you from the Agostino Gemelli Polyclinic, where for several days I have been cared for with loving concern by doctors, nurses and health-care personnel, whom I warmly thank.

Dear brothers and sisters and those who are close to me in every corner of the earth, I reach out to all of you with my gratitude for your sincere and heartfelt affection, which I have felt with special intensity in these days.

I assure you, one and all, of my gratitude, which I express in constant prayer to the Lord for your intentions, as well as for the needs of the Church and the great world causes. Thus, I continue to serve the Church and the whole of humanity, even here in the hospital among other sick persons, of whom I am thinking with affection.

2. Pro-Life Day is being celebrated today here in Italy. In their Message for the occasion, the Italian Bishops emphasized the mystery of life as a relationship that demands trust. We must trust in life!

Unborn children are silently laying claim to trust in life. Many children, deprived of their family for various reasons and who can find a home that welcomes them through adoption or a foster family, also ask for trust.

3. I am thinking with special concern of the beloved Italian People and everyone who has at heart the defence of newborn life. In particular, I stand with the Italian Bishops, who continue to urge Catholics and people of good will to defend the fundamental right to life with respect for the dignity of every human person.

May Mary, Queen of families, help us to succeed in facing the "challenge to life" that is the greatest of the challenges to humanity today.