In his reflection, Pope Francis also spoke about the importance of silence for the Synod on Synodality.
“Silence, in the ecclesial community, makes fraternal communication possible, where the Holy Spirit draws together points of view,” he said. “What is more, silence enables true discernment, through attentive listening to the Spirit’s ‘sighs too deep for words’ (Romans 8:26) that echo, often hidden, within the People of God.”
He added that silence is also essential for the journey of Christian unity.
“Indeed, [silence] is fundamental to prayer, and ecumenism begins with prayer and is sterile without it. Jesus himself prayed that his disciples ‘may all be one’ (John 17:21),” he said.
Pope Francis emphasized that silence is also an important aspect of evangelization, because “truth does not need loud cries to reach people’s hearts.”
“God does not like declarations and shouting, gossiping and noise: rather, he prefers, as he did with Elijah, to speak in the ‘still small voice’ (1 Kings 19:12), in a ‘thread of resounding silence,’” he said.
“We too, then, like Abraham, like Elijah, like Mary, need to free ourselves from so much noise in order to hear his voice. For only in our silence does his word resound,” the pope said.
During the prayer vigil, copies of the Marian icon “Salus Populi Romani” and the San Damiano Cross — before which St. Francis of Assisi received the Lord’s commission to rebuild the Church — were present on the terrace in front of St. Peter’s Basilica.
After the formal end of the service, people were invited to approach the cross and icon for a moment of personal prayer and meditation while the song “Jesus, Remember Me,” was played.
Earlier in the day, hundreds of Christian young adults from around Europe participated in workshops and a praise and worship service organized by the Diocese of Rome at the Basilica of St. John Lateran, before walking about three miles to St. Peter’s Basilica for the ecumenical prayer vigil.
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Hannah Brockhaus is Catholic News Agency’s senior Rome correspondent. She grew up in Omaha, Nebraska, and has a degree in English from Truman State University in Missouri.