Pope earns birthday chorus of approval from pilgrims

BY CAROL GLATZ
PILGRIMS from around the world treated Pope Benedict XVI to an early birthday celebration during his Wednesday general audience in St Peter's Square last week.
Members of the audience broke into a spontaneous rendition of "Happy Birthday, dear Benedict" before the Pope gave a summary
of his catechesis English. It was followed by an encore accompanied by a Bavarian band in traditional costume. The Pope smiled widely, waved and stood in appreciation.
Smaller groups of pilgrims also sang birthday greetings in their native languages. The Pope celebrated his 82nd birthday the next day, on April 16, and marked the fourth anniversary of his election as Pope three days later.
St Peter's Square was still decorated with some of the tulips, daffodils, pansies and flowering trees that were set up for the Pope's Easter morning Mass on April 12.
Benedict XVI used his weekly general audience to underline the importance of celebrating the 5(1day Easter season.
He told an estimated 30,000 people in the square that the festive, joyous period of Easter celebrated Christ's definitive triumph over evil and death.
"To proclaim the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth as a real, historic event, attested to by many authoritative witnesses, is so fundamental to our faith and our Christian testimony," he said.
Asserting the truth of Christ's Resurrection was particularly important today. he said, when "there is no lack of people who try to reduce the Gospel account to a myth or a vision of the apostles, and spread old and worn-out theories as new and scientific", Jesus's Resurrection was not
simply a coming back to life, like Lazarus being raised from the dead, the Pope said.
Jesus's Resurrection marks "an entrance into a new dimension of life meant to transform every human being, all of history and the whole cosmos, he said.
"It illuminates our entire earthly pilgrimage including the human enigma of pain and death.
"Faith in the crucified and risen Christ lies at the heart of the whole Gospel message and is the central nucleus of our belief."
Jesus is gloriously alive "because he conquered the power of death and brought humanity to be in communion with God", he said. Pope Benedict added that although the Resurrection was celebrated every Sunday all year long, Catholics should focus on its meaning and rejoice over it more intensely in the days immediately following Easter.
He asked the faithful to bathe in the brilliant light of the resurrected Christ and to recognise that this joy is something that must be shared.
"We cannot keep this truth that changes everyone's life just for ourselves, we have to be witnesses of divine love," he said.
After the audience Pope Berle
diet returned by helicopter to Castel Gandolfo, south of Rome.
The German band that had played in St Peter's Square performed two musical interludes in the courtyard of the papal villa on the eve of the Pope's birthday.
Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican Secretary of State, visited the Pope in the morning to offer his birthday wishes.
Pope Benedict then had a private lunch with his brother, Mgr Georg Ratzinger, who turned 85 early this year.
The Pope received many letters wishing him a happy birthday. and even some sweets" from government and Church leaders worldwide.
Italian President Giorgio Napolitano sent a special written message for the Pope's birthday and the fourth anniversary of his election as pope. In it he thanked Pope Benedict for his support of those hit by the April 6 earthquake in central Italy.
The president thanked him for his words and gestures, which he said "comforted the whole nation and encouraged us to deeply embrace the message of hope that comes with the celebration of Easter".