During the General Audience this Wednesday, August 27, Pope Leo XIV offered a catechesis centered on the Gospel of St. John, at the moment of Jesus’ arrest in Gethsemane (Jn 18:4). With a firm voice, he emphasized that “Christian hope is not an escape from reality, but a free and courageous choice.”

The Pope recalled that true hope is born from prayer and is expressed in a decision of love that remains even in the midst of suffering.

The Pontiff explained that Jesus, in advancing before those who came to arrest him, neither flees nor hides, but faces the darkness with serenity. “Christ is not defeated, he surrenders himself out of love,” he affirmed. His gesture reveals that true hope does not consist in avoiding pain, but in discovering within it the seed of new life.

When he speaks the words “I am,” Jesus bursts forth with the light of God into the night, showing that hope is not a passing feeling, but a resolve that sustains the believer in the most trying moments.

Leo XIV insisted that defending only one’s own security can chain us, while free and generous love opens the way to trust and renewal, even in the most difficult situations.

The Pope also evoked the figure of the young man who flees naked during Jesus’ arrest, recalling that he reflects our fragility. However, this same figure reappears in the story of the Resurrection, dressed in white, a sign that God transforms human failures into opportunities for grace and forgiveness.

Finally, the Holy Father exhorted the faithful to live each day as a response of love: “Christian hope becomes concrete when, in the midst of trials, we choose to love and entrust ourselves to the will of the Father.”

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Catechesis Cycle – Jubilee 2025. Jesus Christ, our hope. III. The Passover of Jesus. 4.   The Surrender of the Cross. “Whom are you seeking?”  (Jn 18:4)

Viva Brescia! Good morning, everyone! Good morning! Good morning! Please be patient, we’re holding the audience inside. You can follow everything on the screen. After the audience, since I’m also going to the basilica, I’ll stop by here, and so you, those of you in the back, can say hello a bit… Thank you for being here! Good morning! Thank you!

Dear brothers and sisters,

Today we pause for a moment that marks the beginning of Jesus’ Passion: the moment of his arrest in the Garden of Olives. The Evangelist John, with his usual depth, does not present us with a frightened Jesus, fleeing or hiding. On the contrary, he shows us a free man, who steps forward and speaks, courageously facing the hour in which the light of the greatest love can be revealed.

“Jesus, knowing all that was going to happen to him, came forward and said to them, ‘Whom are you looking for?’” (Jn 18:4). Jesus knows this. Yet he chooses not to back down. He gives himself up. Not out of weakness, but out of love. A love so full, so mature, that it doesn’t fear rejection. Jesus isn’t captured: he allows himself to be captured. He isn’t the victim of an arrest, but the author of a gift. This gesture embodies a hope of salvation for our humanity: knowing that, even in the darkest hour, one can remain free to love until the end.

When Jesus answers, “It is I,” the soldiers fall to the ground. This is a mysterious passage, since this expression, in biblical revelation, evokes the very name of God: “I am.” Jesus reveals that God’s presence is manifested precisely where humanity experiences injustice, fear, and loneliness. Precisely there, the true light is ready to shine without fear of being overwhelmed by the advance of darkness.

In the depths of the night, when everything seems to be crumbling, Jesus shows that Christian hope is not escaped, but determination. This attitude is the fruit of a profound prayer in which we do not ask God to free us from suffering, but rather to give us the strength to persevere in love, aware that no one can take away the life freely offered in love.

“If you are seeking me, let these men go” (Jn 18:8). At the moment of his arrest, Jesus isn’t concerned with saving himself: he only wants his friends to go free. This shows that his sacrifice is a true act of love. Jesus allows himself to be captured and imprisoned by the guards just so he can set his disciples free.

Jesus lived every day of his life in preparation for this dramatic and sublime moment. Therefore, when it arrives, he has the strength not to seek escape. His heart knows well that losing one’s life for love is not a failure, but possesses a mysterious fruitfulness. Like a grain of wheat that, when it falls to the ground, does not remain alone, but dies and bears fruit.

Jesus, too, is troubled by a path that seems to lead only to death and the end. But he is equally convinced that only a life lost for love is ultimately found again. This is true hope: not in trying to avoid pain, but in believing that, even at the heart of the most unjust suffering, the seed of new life is hidden.

And us? How often do we defend our lives, our projects, our certainties, without realizing that, in doing so, we leave ourselves alone. The logic of the Gospel is different: only what is given flourishes, only love that becomes selfless can restore trust even where all seems lost.

The Gospel of Mark also tells us of a young man who, when Jesus is arrested, flees naked (Mark 14:51). It is an enigmatic but deeply evocative image. We too, in our attempt to follow Jesus, experience moments in which we are surprised and stripped of our certainties. These are the most difficult moments, in which we are tempted to abandon the path of the Gospel because love seems an impossible journey. However, it will be a young man, at the end of the Gospel, who will announce the resurrection to the women, no longer naked, but dressed in a white robe.

This is the hope of our faith: our sins and our hesitations do not prevent God from forgiving us and restoring our desire to resume our following, to enable us to give our lives for others.

Dear brothers and sisters, let us also learn to entrust ourselves to the Father’s good will, allowing our lives to be a response to the good received. In life, it is not necessary to have everything under control. It is enough to choose each day to love freely. This is true hope: knowing that, even in the darkness of trial, God’s love sustains us and ripens within us the fruit of eternal life.

Summary of Catechesis:

Dear brothers and sisters, in our continuing catechesis on the Jubilee theme of “Christ our Hope,” today we consider the freedom and determination shown by Jesus at the moment of his arrest in the Garden of Olives.  Our Lord approaches his coming passion freely and consciously, in obedience to the will of the Father and as an act of redemptive love.  In this way, he reveals the essence of true hope: the firm conviction that even in the midst of violence, injustice and suffering, God’s love is ever present as a source of spiritual fruitfulness and the promise of eternal life.  The way that Jesus exercised his freedom in the face of death teaches us not to fear suffering, but to persevere in confident trust in God’s providential care.  May our lives always be marked by this hope, born of the knowledge that if we surrender to God’s will and freely give our lives in love for others, the Father’s grace will sustain us in every trial and enable us to bear abundant fruit for the salvation of our brothers and sisters.

Greeting:

I am happy to welcome, this morning, the English-speaking pilgrims and visitors, especially those from England, Ireland, Scotland, Malta, South Africa, Indonesia, Taiwan, Timor-Leste, Vietnam, Canada and the United States of America.  With prayerful good wishes that the present Jubilee of Hope may be for you and your families a time of grace and spiritual renewal, I invoke upon you all the joy and the peace of Our Lord Jesus Christ.