Being Happy - by Pope Francis

"You may have defects, be anxious and sometimes live irritated, but do not forget that your life is the greatest enterprise in the world. Only you can prevent it from going into decadence. There are many that need you, admire you and love you.

I would like to remind you that being happy is not having a sky without storms, or roads without accidents, or work without fatigue, or relationships without disappointments.

Being happy is finding strength in forgiveness, hope in one’s battles, security at the stage of fear, love in disagreements.

Being happy is not only to treasure the smile, but that you also reflect on the sadness.

It is not just commemorating the event, but also learning lessons in failures.

It is not just having joy with the applause, but also having joy in anonymity.

Being happy is to recognize that it is worthwhile to live, despite all the challenges, misunderstandings and times of crises.

Being happy is not inevitable fate, but a victory for those who can travel towards it with your own being.

Being happy is to stop being a victim of problems but become an actor in history itself.

It is not only to cross the deserts outside of ourselves, but still more, to be able to find an oasis in the recesses of our soul.

It is to thank God every morning for the miracle of life.

Being happy is not being afraid of one's feelings. It is to know how to talk about ourselves. It is to bear with courage when hearing a "no".

It is to have the security to receive criticism, even if is unfair.

It is to kiss the children, pamper the parents, have poetic moments with friends, even if they have hurt us.

Being happy means allowing the free, happy and simple child inside each of us to live; having the maturity to say, "I was wrong"; having the audacity to say, "forgive me".

It is to have sensitivity in expressing, "I need you"; to have the ability of saying, "I love you."

So that your life becomes a garden full of opportunities for being happy...

In your spring-time, may you become a lover of joy. In your winter, may you become a friend of wisdom.

And when you go wrong along the way, you start all over again. Thus you will be more passionate about life.

And you will find that happiness is not about having a perfect life but about using tears to water tolerance, losses to refine patience, failures to carve serenity, pain to lapidate pleasure, obstacles to open the windows of intelligence.

Never give up .... Never give up on the people you love. Never give up from being happy because life is an incredible show.

And you are a special human being!"

- Pope Francis -

Homily, Palm Sunday 2013 (Summary from NEW BEGINNING, NEW HOPE)

The first word that I wish to say to you: Joy!

Do not be men and women of sadness: A Christian can never be sad! Never give way to discouragement! Ours is not a joy born of having many possessions, but from having encountered a Person: Jesus, in our midst; it is born from knowing that with him we are never alone, even at difficult moments, even when our life's journey comes up against problems and obstacles that seem insurmountable.

Let us follow Jesus! We accompany, we follow Jesus, but above all we know that he accompanies us and carries us on his shoulders. This is our joy, this is the hope that we must bring to this world. Please do not let yourselves be robbed of hope! Do not let hope be stolen! The hope that Jesus gives us.

The second word is: Cross!

Jesus does not enter the Holy City to receive the honors reserved to earthly kings, to the powerful, to rulers; he enters to be scourged, insulted, and abused, as Isaiah foretold in the First Reading (Is 50:6). He enters to receive a crown of thorns, a staff, a purple robe: his kingship becomes an object of derision. He enters to climb Calvary, carrying his burden of wood. 

This is the good that Jesus does for us on the throne of the Cross. Christ's Cross embraced with love never leads to sadness, but to joy, to the joy of having been saved and of doing a little of what he did on the day of his death.

The third word: Young People!

We must live the faith with a young heart, always: a young heart, even at the age of seventy or eighty.

Dear young people! With Christ, the heart never grows old! Yet all of us - all of you - know very well that the King whom we follow and who accompanies us is very special: he is a King who loves even to the Cross and who teaches us to serve and to love. And you are not ashamed of his Cross! On the contrary, you embrace it, because you have understood that it is in giving ourselves, in emerging from ourselves, that we have true joy and that, with his love, God conquered evil.

Young people must say to the world: to follow Christ is good; to go with Christ is good; the message of Christ is good; emerging from ourselves, to the ends of the earth and of existence, to take Jesus there, is good!