1949 Christmas message of Pope Pius XII : radio message to the world given December 23, 1949 / by Hi


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1949 Christmas Message

of Pope Pius XII

National Catholic Welfare Conference

1312 Massachusetts Avenue, N. W. Washington 5, D. C.



Digitized by the Internet Archive

in 2016-

https ://archive.org/details/1949christmasmespius



Radio Message to the World Given

December 23
,
1949

,
by His

Holiness, Pope Pius XII

Never before perhaps as onthis vigil, which opens the
happy event of the new Jubilee

Year, has Our heart of Father and
Pastor felt you so close and united to
Us beloved sons and daughters of the
universe. We seem to see millions
upon millions of the faithful and hear
the thrill of their voices—and Our
heart does not deceive Us—in union
with Ours forming an immense chorus
of fervent thanksgiving, eager longing
and humble petition to the Father,
Giver of every good gift, to the Son,
Expiator of every wrong, to the Holy
Ghost, Dispenser of every grace.

Impelled by a profound desire to
freedom of the spirit, drawn by the
charm of heavenly goods, forgetful
for a brief hour of the tribulations of
earth, you turn to Us and all but
repeat, in a good sense and with the
right intention, the plea made long
ago to the Redeemer (Mark 8, 11-12;
Luke 11,16): “Give us a sign from
Heaven.”

Well, then, “Today you will know
that the Lord will come, and at dawn
you shall see His glory.” The sign
you are waiting for shall be an-
nounced to you today; the sign, or

rather the means of remission and
sanctification, shall be given to you

precisely tomorrow, at the moment
when by Our hands the Mystic Door
is to be removed once again, thus
opening the entrance to the greatest

temple of Christendom—symbol of the
Redeemer Jesus, given to us through
Mary in order that, incorporated in
Him, we all may find salvation: “I
am the door. By Me, if any man enter
in, he shall be saved” (John 10,9).

From the entire Church of Christ,
which has spread its members to every
region of our planet, eyes are fixed

these days on Rome, on this Apostolic
See, the perennial fountain of truth,

salvation and benediction.
We know what great hopes you

have placed in this Holy Year. Staunch
in Our heart is the trust the Divine
Providence may design to work in it
and through it the marvels of His
mercy for the human family. And We
are supported by the hope that the
Angel of the Lord may not encounter
any obstacles on his journey, but rather
find the ways made straight and hearts
opened by that good will which draws
Heaven towards earth.

We Ourselves, to whom Divine



Providence has reserved the privilege

of proclaiming and granting it to the

whole world, already foresee its im-

portance for the coming half-century.

It seems to Us that the Holy Year
of 1950 must be decisive, especially

for the longed-for religious renewal

of the modern world, and that it must

solve that spiritual crisis which

oppresses the souls of our age. The
rightful harmony between heavenly

values and those of earth, between the

Divine and the human, which is the

office and duty of our generation, wdll

be realized or at least hastened, if the

faithful of Christ remain firm in their

resolves, continue steadfast in the

work they have undertaken, and refuse

to allow themselves to be seduced by

vain utopias or led astray by party

interests and selfishness.

It should be decisive as well for the

future of the Church, engaged in an

effort to render more pure and wide-

spread the sanctity of its members,

while exteriorly she strives to infuse

and spread her spirit of justice and

love even in civil institutions.

Animated by these sentiments and

hopes, deeply affected by the dignity

of a tradition which goes back to the

times of Our predecessor Boniface
VIII, in opening the Holy Door with
three strokes of a hammer, We shall
be conscious of performing no mere

traditional act, but a symbolic rite of

high import not only for Christians but

for the whole human race. We like
to hope that this triple stroke may
re-echo deep down in the souls of all
those who have ears to hear (Matt. 11,
15).

Holy Year, Year of God, of God
Whose majesty and grandeur con-

demns sin; of God Whose goodness
and mercy oflFers pardon and grace to
anyone disposed to receive it; of God
Who in this Holy Year wishes to come
still closer to man and to remain
nearer to him than ever before.

How many people look on sin as
a mere "weakness,” and even make
of this weakness a virtue! "Indeed,”
wrote the pagan Sallust long ago, (Ca-
til. 52) "We have lost the true mean-
ing of words, for the giving of another

man's goods is called liberality, and
audacity in doing evil passes for
courage” (Equidem nos vera vocabula
rerum amisimus, quia bona aliena lar-
giri liberalitas, malarum rerum audacia
fortitudo vocatur) . By artfully chang-
ing the meaning of words in the most
important questions of public and
private life, these people hide what
conscience does not wish to make clear;
they approve what in their heart of
hearts they condemn; they deny what
they ought loyally to admit.

How many set up their idols in the
place of God, or, while affirming their
belief in God and their desire to serve
Him, make for themselves an idea of
Him which is the product of their own
desires, of their own inclinations, of
their own weaknesses ! God in His im-
mense grandeur, in His immaculate
sanctity; God, Whose goodness com-
prehends so well the hearts that He
Himself has fashioned (Psalm 32,15)
and Whose kindness is ever ready to
come to their aid, is not rightly under-
stood by many. This explains why
there are so many Christians merely
through habit, so many who are listless
and careless, and, on the other hand,
so many souls that are tormented and

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without hope, as though Christianity

were not itself the ’’Good Tidings.”

False ideas of God, vain creations of

minds all too human, which the Holy

Year must dissipate and banish from

the hearts of meri

!

The spontaneous welcome with
which the world greeted its announce-

ment confirms the trust that We had
placed in the Holy Year. It will not

be a noisy festival, nor a pretext for

pious distractions, nor yet a conceited

display of Catholic strength in the

sense understood by the world, which

makes success consist in the momentary

plaudits of vast masses. The Holy Year
must do its work more seriously and

deeply in the minds of men; it must

encourage and promote more widely

the practice of virtue in public and

private; it must be and appear more

intimate and more sincerely Christian.

It must needs conform to the secret

design of God; it must needs charac-

terize itself as the year of the great

return, year of great pardon in the

measure at least that our present age

even very recently has been an epoch

of apostasy and guilt.

Beginning today. We direct to the
whole world, then. Our plea that all
men and each one in particular, from
every land and every shore, may accom-
plish the desired great return with all

the urgency demanded by these ex-
traordinary times. Our invitation is
meant to be above all that of a Father

who lives, toils, sufiFers, prays and
hopes for the good and happiness of
his children. And all men on earth are
Our children, at least by right and
divine purpose (saltern iure et destina-

tione), even those who have aban-

doned Us, who have injured Us, who
have made and still make Us suflFer.
To you do We appeal, children, who

are far away, lost, deluded or embit-

tered, and especially to you for whom
treacherous words and perhaps a short-

sighted view of reality have stifled in

your hearts the affection you once had

for Holy Church; do not spurn the
offer of reconciliation which God Him-
self offers you through Us during a
truly acceptable time. From this mo-
ment on, be assured that sweet are the
ways that lead back to the house of

the Father, and full of joy is the wel-

come that awaits you.
May this Holy Year mark the return

to God of those souls who, for many
and varied reasons, have had their

minds and hearts blinded to the image

and memory of their .Creator, from
Whom there has come their very life
as well as that of all other beings, and
in Whom their highest happiness rests.

Whether they are far away
because of a careless and agnostic atti-
tude towards the most important
problem of life; or whether they say
they are satisfied with a fictitious no-

tion of the universe in which the
necessary place is denied to the primary

spiritual principle of what exists or
can exist; or whether, intolerant of

His indestructible presence and fool-
ishly jealous of His supreme dominion,
they declare ridiculous war against
Him and attempt to suppress the wit-
ness that all creatures and even their
own hearts give Him; all these people
are enduring the pang of exile,
supreme loneliness, the emptiness of a
desert, to which they have condemned
themselves by accepting atheism. For
them there is only one remedy—return

;



a return to the deep and calm consid-
eration of the reason of things, and by
rising step by step along the scale of
beings from efFect to cause until the
inquiring mind rests in tranquil re-
pose; a return finally to the humility

and docility befitting a creature. Then
there will appear to their eyes and
they will almost be able to feel in the

unchallengable testimony of His works,
the God of the Living, Who is our
Father, and that love which torments
until it is possessed.

Our heart tells Us that this Holy
Year will see many of these returns,
as it will see multiple conversions to

the Christian Faith of pagans in

mission lands. It will be a comfort to
you to know that since the Jubilee of
1925 the number of Catholics in those
far off countries has more than doubled.
And in some districts of Africa the

Visible Church has become the founda-
tion of social life, thanks to the deep

Christian influence exerted both in

private and public life. But with the

greatest grief of soul We cannot help
thinking of the grave dangers threat-

ening or already afilicting religion and

its institutions in other countries of

Europe and Asia, like limitless China,
where revolutionary upheavals in con-
ditions that were already unstable have

converted fields flourishing with life

into cemeteries of death.

May the Holy Year mark the return
to the Redeemer Jesus Christ for souls
allured by sinful attractions and living

far from the Father’s house. There

are believers and Catholics whose spirit
is weak, also, as the flesh makes them
traitors to their rightful duties and
forgetful of the real treasures, and who

live in a continual sequence of desertion

and lapses. They are wrong if they
think they possess the Christian life

and are pleasing to God unless sancti-
fying grace dwells habitually in their

souls.

Owing to easy compromises between
earth and Heaven, time and eternity,
matter and spirit, they are drawn into
the danger of dying of misery and
hunger, far away from Jesus Who does
not admit among His followers those
who want to serve two masters. For
these wounded in spirit, lepers, par-
alytics, broken branches without the
life-giving sap, may the Holy Year be
a period of healing and amendment.
The angel of the pool of probation
desires to renew for all of them the
miracle of the healing waters: who will
not wish to be bathed in them.^
The venerable /ather of the Gospel

story is waiting anxiously on the
threshold of the Holy Door for the
contrite return of the prodigal son;

who will wish to remain obstinate in
the desert of this guilt.^

Oh that this Holy Year could wel-
come also the great return to the one

true Church, awaited over the centuries,

of so many who, though believing in
Jesus Christ, are for various reasons

separated from her! With unspeak-
able groanings, the spirit, that is in

the hearts of good people, today cries
out imploringly the same praper of

Our Lord: that they may be one (ut
unum sint) (Jn. 17, 11). With good
reason men are anxious about the
effrontery with which the united front

of militant atheism advances; and the

old question is now voiced aloud : Why
are there still separations? Why are



there still schisms? When will all the
forces of ' the spirit and of love be

harmoniously united?

If on other occasions an invitation

to unity has been sent forth from this

Apostolic See, on this occasion We
repeat it more warmly and paternally;

We feel that We are urged by the
pleadings and prayers of numerous be-
lievers scattered over the whole earth,
who, after suffering tragic and painful
events, turn their eyes towards this
Apostolic See as toward an anchor of
salvation for the whole world.

For all those who adore Christ—^not
excluding those who sincerely but
vainly await His coming and adore
Him as the One promised by the
prophets and still to come—do We
open the Holy Door, and at the same
time We extend a welcome from the
heart of a father whose fatherhood in
the inscrutable design of God has come
to Us from Jesus the Redeemer.

Finally may this Jubilee be the year
of the great return of all mankind to
the Divine Plan.

Just as the modern world has tried
to shake off the sweet yoke of God, so
it has rejected along with it the order
He established, and with the self-
same pride that moved the rebel angel
at the beginning of creation, has pre-
tended to set up another of his own
choice.

After about two centuries of sorry
experience and deviation, those who
are still sincere and honest admit that
plans and impositions of this sort,
which bear the name but lack the sub-
stance of order, have not produced
their promised results and fail to
satisfy the natural aspirations of man.

This failure is evident at two levels:

that of social and of international

relations.

In the social field the counterfeiting

of God’s plan has gone to its very

roots by deforming the Divine image

of man. Instead of His real created

nature with origin and destiny in God,

there has been substituted the false

notion of a man whose conscience is
a law unto himself, who is his own
legislator brooking no control, who has
no responsibility towards his fellows

and society, with no destiny beyond

the earth and no other purpose than

the enjoyment of finite goods, with

no rule of life except that of the jait

accompli and the unbridled satisfac-

tion of his desires.
As an outgrowth of this, which

came to wield increasing power over
a long period of years because ofdts

most varied applications in public and

private life, was that narrowly indi-
vidualistic order which today is in
serious crisis almost everywhere. But
the more recent innovators have pro-
vided no better results. Starting from
the same mistaken premises and taking
the downward path in another direc-
tion, they have led to no less disastrous
consequences, including the complete

overthrow of the Divine order, con-

tempt for the dignity of the human
person, the denial of the most sacred

and fundamental freedoms, the dom-
ination of a single class over the others,

the enslavement of all persons and
property in a totalitarian state and the
legalization of violence and to militant
atheism.

To those who support one or other
of these social systems, both of which

are foreign and opposed to the Divine

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plan, may there be a persuasive ring
in the invitation to return to natural

and Christian principles on which is
based effective justice with respect for

legitimate freedoms; may the recogni-
tion of the fact that all men are equal
as regards the inviolability of personal

rights put an end to the futile struggle
which provokes hatred of brother for
brother.

But besides these desires, which go
to make up the constant solicitude of
Our Apostolic Office, We address
words of fatherly exhortation to those
who place all their hope in the
premises of a doctrine and of leaders
who explicitly profess materialism and
atheism.

To the lowly and oppressed We say:
no matter how sad your lot in life
may be, even though you have a per-
fect right to claim justice for your-

selves, and others have the duty of
according you that right, remember
that you possess an immortal soul and

a destiny beyond all this world can

give.

Do not allow yourselves to exchange
heavenly and everlasting goods for

those that are perishable and fleeting,
especially in this age when upright
and beneficient institutions are lending

a more sympathetic ear to your cry,
and, understanding your plight, are

resolved to guide you along the ways
of justice.

You often place your faith and trust
in men who are as positive in prom-
ising to solve all your problems as

they are incapable of effecting the

facile solutions which they hold out
so dazzingly before your eyes—indeed,
some of these problems do not admit
of any easy solution owing to the very

limitations of human nature. Reserve,
then, this faith and trust in the first
place for the promises of God. Who
does not deceive.

You are rightly solicitous for your
daily bread and a suitable home which
are indispensable for your maintenance

and that of your families: see that this
solicitude is not in conflict with your

heavenly destiny. Let it not make you
forgetful or neglectful of your soul

and of the imperishable treasures
which God has entrusted to you in the
souls of your children.

Let it not obscure the vision or

hinder the gaining of those eternal

goods which will constitute your ever-
lasting happiness and which become a

reality in the supreme good for which

we are created: our happiness in God.
Only a society illuminated by the dic-

tates of faith, respectful of the rights

of God, certain of the account which

responsible leaders will have to render

to the Supreme Judge in the depths of

their conscience and in the presence of

the living and the dead—only such a
society will be able to interpret cor-

rectly your needs and just aspirations

to defend and fight for your rights, to

guide you with wisdom in the fulfil-

ment of your duties in accordance with

the hierarchy of values and the har-

mony of domestic and civil life that
nature has established.

Do not forget that without God
material prosperity is for those who do
not possess it a tormenting wound,

while for those who do, it proves a
death trap. Without God intellectual
and aesthetic culture is as a river cut

off from its source and its outlet; it

becomes a quagmire filled with sand

and mud.

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We expect from the Holy Year,
finally, the return of international

society to the plan mapped out by
God. According to this plan all peo-
ples—in peace and not in war, in
collaboration and not in isolation, in

justice and not in national selfishness

—

are meant to make up a great human
family bent on the advancement of
common interest, through mutual aid
and a fair distribution of this world’s
goods which are a treasure entrusted
to men by God.

Beloved sons, if ever there was an
occasion which seemed propitious for
exhorting the rulers of people to

thoughts of peace, that of the Holy
Year seems to Us the most propitious
of all. It is, and is intended to be,
an urgent appeal and at the same time
a contribution to the brotherhood of
nations.

Here in Rome, the Mother of
Peoples, there will meet together

innumerable groups of pilgrims of

different races, nations, languages, cus-

toms and character. And within these
very walls they will live together, they

will meet on the same streets, lodge
in the same hotels, take part in the
same rites, quench their thirst at the

same spiritual fountains, enjoy the

same consolations. There will be
among them those who were com-
manded to deal out death and those
who suffered its terrible effects, the
invader and the conquered; the keeper
of the barbed-wire prison-camp and
the prisoner who endured its cruel
confinement.

Have we not then, reason to believe
that these thousands and thousands of
our devoted sons and daughters will
become the faithful vanguard in the

crusade for peace, and that with Our

blessing they will bring home with
them the meaning and the power of

the peace of Christ, to win new re-
cruits for so holy a cause

God forbid that the "Truce of God,"
the augury and the inspiration of

peaceful counsels, should be disturbed

or violated by reckless schemes, not

only on the part of nations, but of
different groups within the same coun-

try. Such a sacrilegious hand could

call down upon itself the just anger
of God and would incur the most
certain condemnation of all mankind.

We expect, then, a great homecom-
ing during this year of extraordinary

grace; great because of the number
of children for whom We reserve a
most affectionate welcome; great be-

cause of the distance some of them
will have to come, great because of the

immensely beneficial results that will

derive from it without fail. May all
Our sons and all men of good will
lovingly imdertake not to disappoint

the hopes of the Common Father, who
holds up His hand to heaven in prayer
that the new outpouring of Divine
mercy upon the world may surpass all
expectation.

Because of this meeting of com-

passionate and gentle love which will
spread its flame from Rome all over
the world, every return to God, to

Jesus Christ, to the Church and to the
Divine Plan, will be sealed by the

loving embrace of the Father of

Mercies, Who pardons the every fault
and remits the every punishment of
him who loves. Jesus has revealed
to us the real countenance of God,
portraying It in the father who wel-
comes, embraces, forgives the prodigal

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son who returns heartbroken but with
confidence to the home he had fool-
ishly left.

If the Jubilee is a time of extra-

ordinary return for men, it will be for
God an occasion for more generous
and loving pardon.
And who does not stand in need of

God’s forgiveness ? Although the
Lord is ready to pardon, He does not
dispense the sinner from the necessity
of sincere repentance and due expia-
tion.

Let the Holy Year, then, be chiefly
a year of repentance and expiation.
Interior and voluntary repentance to-
gether with expiation are the indis-

pensable perquisites of every human
renovation. Ihey signify a halt in the
downward course; they express an
acknowledgment of one’s own sins,
they manifest the sincerity of one’s

goodwill.

The value of voluntary expiation is
enhanced when it is collective, and
offered in union with the Chief
Expiator of the sin of men, Jesus
Christ Our Redeemer.

During this Holy Year which re-
calls the expiation of Calvary, expiate,

beloved sons, your own sins and those
of others; bury all the past in sincere
repentance, persuaded that if the
present generation has been so griev-
ously stricken by chastisements fash-
ioned by its ov/n hands, it is because
it has sinned with great deliberation
and wantonness.

There passes before Our eyes, as in
mournful procession, the sad counte-
nance of orphans, of widows, of
mothers who await the homecoming of
one who perhaps will never come back
to them, of those who are being per-

secuted for justice and religion, of the
prisoners, of the refugees, of those

who are enduring forced exile, of
those in jail, of the unemployed, the
oppressed, the physical and mental
sufferers, of the victims of every form
of injustice. So many tears bedew the
face of the earth, so much blood em-
purples it. These are indeed an ex-
piation in themselves, and often for
faults of others, still they call in their

turn for further expiation, so that guilt

may be wiped out and Christian joy
restored.

Who will want to separate himself
from this world of expiation, which
has for its head the Divine Crucified
in person and embraces the entire
Church Militant?
With such generous promises on

the part of God, never perhaps was
a Holy Year better suited to counsel
gentleness, indulgence and pardon be-
tween man and man.
When, in recent times, taking their

rise from an unfortunate war or
political upheavals, waves of reprisals
were unleashed, unequalled in history
at least for the number of their victims,
Our heart was pierced with bitter grief,
not only because of the misfortune that

bred other misfortunes and hurled
into the fray thousands of families who
were often innocent, but because with
utter sadness We saw here the tragic
evidence of apostasy from the spirit
of Christ.

Whoever would be a sincere Chris-
tian must know how to forgive. "Thou
wicked servant’’—is the rebuke of the
Gospel parable (Matt. 18, 32)‘

—
"was

it not thy duty to have mercy on thy
fellow-servant, as I had on thee?’’
When reasonable motives are pres-

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ent, charity and mercy do not run

counter to one’s duty to administer

justice aright. But imprudent intoler-
ance and the spirit of reprisal most
certainly do, especially when vengeance
is taken by public authority against
one who has erred rather than sinned,
or when a punishment deservedly in-
flicted is prolonged beyond all rea-
sonable limits.

May the Lord inspire all who are in
positions of public responsibility with

thoughts of reconciliation and concord,

and without prejudice to common
good, let an end be put to the last
remnant of those extraordinary laws

which have nothing to do with com-
mon crimes deserving just punishment,
and which, long years after the cessa-
tion of hostilities, cause in so many
families and individuals a feeling of ex-
asperation against the society in which
they are made to suffer.

Hence, in the name of Jesus Christ
Who has given to men an example by
offering Himself in sacrifice even for
His executioners. We implore govern-
ments, especially Christian govern-

ments, to exercise generously their

right of pardon, and put into effect,
on an occasion so solemn and propiti-
ous as the Holy Year, that mitigation
of punitive justice provided for in
the laws of all countries.

The religion and piety which (as
We hope) will inspire such acts of
clemency, so far from weakening the
force of law or lessening respect for

it in the minds of the citizens, will be
a strong motive for its beneficiaries

when they resume their coveted liberty
or have their term of sentence short-
ened to improve their lives and repair.

if necessary, the past by a sincere and

lasting conversion as mark of their
good faith.

We, and along with Us the hearts
of so many afflicted relatives, ask this
consolation; for the happiness of his

sons is the joy of the father. Here
We express publicly Our sincere grati-
tude to those governments which have

in various degrees given favorable con-

sideration to Our wish or have left
Us with some hope of obtaining its
fulfillment.

Securus jam carpe viam—Set out
upon your journey without fear.

Beloved sons. We have revealed to
you the sentiments of Our heart on
the vigil of the opening of the Holy
Door; you can read there Our pur-
poses, Our hopes, and Our prayers.

Accept Our invitation to your
Father’s house. From far and near,
from every continent and region, from
every country and by every route,
crossing the oceans or flying through

the air, come here on your journey
without fear, whoever you may be
that comes a pilgrim from the western
shores to venerate the heights of Peter.

You, who long years ago left your
hearth and home and grew accustomed
to the hardships of long journeys with

the armies at war or with the throngs
of refugees, emigrants, or displaced

persons, take to the road again, but

this time in joy like a peaceful legion

praying and doing penance on your
way to the common fatherland of
Christians.

Koma mihi patria—^Rome my father-
land.

For without privilege of race or

class, Rome is the fatherland of all;

["]



every Christian can and should say;
‘'Rome is my fatherland.”

Here God’s supernatural Providence
over souls is more particularly in evi-
dence; here the Saints acquired the
norm and inspiration of their hero-
ism; this land of benediction knew the
triumphs of the martyrs and was the
training ground of dauntless con-
fessors. Here is the immovable Rock
to which your hopes are anchored;
it is the site and ancient Tropeaeum
of the glorious tomb of the Prince of
the Apostles on which rests the chair
of a perennial authority of the Vicar
of Christ.

In the magnificence of the basilicas,

in the beauty of the solemn liturgy, in
the twilight of the ancient Christian

cemeteries close by the major relics of
the Saints, you will breathe in the air
of sanctity, of peace and universality

which will serve to give to your life
a profound Christian renewal.
And you, beloved sons of Rome,

nearest to Us and more immediately
united to Us by the bonds of Our
pastoral ministry, who frequently dur-
ing the past ten years have given Us
no uncertain proofs of your filial
attachment, you will be second to none
in bringing your lives and conduct
into harmony with the lofty aims of
the Holy Year. It is for you to show
a special charity in welcoming your

brethren from distant lands, to give
an example of courtesy and sincere

practice of your religious duties.

May the almighty and merciful God
grant these Our wishes and in token
of the generous mercies of Heaven
may there descend upon you who are
listening, upon all men of good will,
upon diose whose return We wait.
Our Apostolic Benediction.