Today is a very solemn day. It is a day of mourning. Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, he’ll be laid to rest. We pray for his soul. The thing that I remember most about him is how Pope John Paul II asked him when he was Cardinal Ratzinger, “What are you gonna do when you retire?” And Cardinal Ratzinger said, very simply, “I want to write a book about the Lord.” Cardinal Ratzinger, who goes on to follow Pope John Paul II, not to just write a book about the Lord but to witness the faith of Peter and to witness to all of us what it means to be close to Jesus.
He did so many things. He wrote so many books and he gave great orations and speeches. But the thing that everyone will remember about Pope Benedict the XVI is that he knew Jesus and he was a friend of Jesus. And so we are called to not worry about all of these crazy things that we could do in our lives but do we really care about knowing Jesus and being a friend of Jesus? Because that’s what lasts. Eternal rest grant unto him, O Lord, and let perpetual light shine upon him.
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