SPEAKER_00: Today we're here at the Pope John Paul II Center.
SPEAKER_00: And you'll see many photographs, vestments, documents, work of art, places of prayer, and so many reminders of the extraordinary life of St.
SPEAKER_00: John Paul II.
SPEAKER_00: But here near us, right just over on the other side, is something much simpler: a stone.
SPEAKER_00: A stone that once covered his tomb in St.
SPEAKER_00: Peter's Basilica.
SPEAKER_00: And perhaps that stone preaches a better homily than I can.
SPEAKER_00: Because think about the man whose name is carved upon it.
SPEAKER_00: He stood before millions, he traveled the world, he met presidents and kings, he helped shape the course of history.
SPEAKER_00: He wrote encyclicals that are still being studied.
SPEAKER_00: He spoke words that help awaken the conscience of nations.
SPEAKER_00: And after all of that, what was placed over him?
SPEAKER_00: A piece of stone.
SPEAKER_00: Joannes Paulus du a name.
SPEAKER_00: And that's where Saint Paul's words today become almost uncomfortable.
SPEAKER_00: What do you possess that you have not received?
SPEAKER_00: Your intelligence, your abilities, your vocation, your opportunities, the people who have loved you, the doors that have opened for you, even the years that you have given on this earth.
SPEAKER_00: Received, received, received.
SPEAKER_00: And Saint Paul says, if you have received it, why do you live as though it belongs entirely to you?
SPEAKER_00: That may be one of the greatest lessons of Saint John Paul II.
SPEAKER_00: Something that we have not yet spoken about on this pilgrimage.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because we've talked about where he was born.
SPEAKER_00: We stood near the font where he was baptized.
SPEAKER_00: We have prayed at the chapel connected to his priestly ordination.
SPEAKER_00: We have walked through the many places here in Krakow that have formed him.
SPEAKER_00: And now we come to this center dedicated to preserving his teaching and his legacy.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps today the Lord is asking us to stop studying John Paul II for a moment and allow John Paul II to question us.
SPEAKER_00: What are you doing with what you have received?
SPEAKER_00: Because Carol Boytiwa received gifts, but gifts do not make saints.
SPEAKER_00: What matter is what we do with them.
SPEAKER_00: He received an intellect and he gave it to the church.
SPEAKER_00: He received a voice and he used it to proclaim Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: He received suffering, and somehow even that became an offering.
SPEAKER_00: He received influence and he tried to use it at the service of human dignity.
SPEAKER_00: He received a vocation and spent his entire life answering to it.
SPEAKER_00: And eventually, like every one of us will, he gave everything back.
SPEAKER_00: That's why I love that we're celebrating Mass here in this beautiful chapel.
SPEAKER_00: Because Christianity is not ultimately about preserving the memory of great Christians.
SPEAKER_00: It is about becoming one.
SPEAKER_00: And that brings us to the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: The Pharisees are watching Jesus and his disciples walk through the fields.
SPEAKER_00: The disciples are hungry.
SPEAKER_00: They pick the grain.
SPEAKER_00: Immediately the Pharisees begin measuring, judging, and calculating.
SPEAKER_00: Why are you doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus responds by bringing them back to what is essential.
SPEAKER_00: The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, you have become so preoccupied with the gift that you have forgotten the giver.
SPEAKER_00: Even something as sacred as the Sabbath can become distorted when God disappears from the very center of it.
SPEAKER_00: And the same can happen to religion.
SPEAKER_00: We can know the rules and forget Christ.
SPEAKER_00: We can preserve traditions and forget why they exist.
SPEAKER_00: We can visit very holy places and remain unchanged.
SPEAKER_00: We can admire saints without ever seriously trying to become one.
SPEAKER_00: We can even make a pilgrimage all through this beautiful land of Poland.
SPEAKER_00: Photographs every church, venerate every relic, hear every story, and go home exactly as we arrived.
SPEAKER_00: And that would be a tragedy.
SPEAKER_00: Because the purpose of this pilgrimage is not simply to know more about John Paul II.
SPEAKER_00: It's to know Jesus Christ more deeply.
SPEAKER_00: John Paul would have been horrified if we stopped at him.
SPEAKER_00: His entire life pointed somewhere else to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: That's why perhaps the most important question as his pilgrimage continues is no longer, what did Pope John Paul II do?
SPEAKER_00: Well, we know what he did.
SPEAKER_00: The question is, what will we do with what we have been given?
SPEAKER_00: What we have received?
SPEAKER_00: And maybe God has given you something that you have been wasting.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe there's a relationship that needs healing.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe there's a vocation within your vocation that you have been neglecting.
SPEAKER_00: And maybe your prayer has become mechanical or non-existent.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe you've been postponing something God has been asking of you.
SPEAKER_00: Or maybe just you have spent much of your life asking God for more when the real question is, what have you done with what He's already given you?
SPEAKER_00: What do you possess that you have not received?
SPEAKER_00: Well, very little.
SPEAKER_00: Perhaps nothing.
SPEAKER_00: And one day, unless the Lord comes first, there will be a stone with our name on it too.
SPEAKER_00: Most of us will not have museums.
SPEAKER_00: There will probably never be a center dedicated to studying our writings.
SPEAKER_00: Pilgrims will not travel across the ocean to see where we lived, and that's perfectly alright.
SPEAKER_00: Because Jesus never asked us to be remembered by the world.
SPEAKER_00: He asks us to be faithful.
SPEAKER_00: Saint Paul said something beautiful at the end of the first reading today.
SPEAKER_00: Even if you should have countless guides to Christ, yet you do not have many fathers, for I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: That's legacy.
SPEAKER_00: Not that people remember your name, but that because you lived, someone else came closer to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: A child, a spouse, a friend, a parishioner, a stranger.
SPEAKER_00: Someone who encountered mercy because you were merciful.
SPEAKER_00: Someone who believed again because you refused to give up on them.
SPEAKER_00: Someone who discovered Christ because you were not afraid to live as though Christ were real.
SPEAKER_00: That's a life worth living behind.
SPEAKER_00: So when we look at that stone today, do not only see the tombstone of Saint John Paul II.
SPEAKER_00: Allow it to ask you a question.
SPEAKER_00: When everything else has been stripped away, what will your life remain?
SPEAKER_00: Well, hopefully not simply what we accomplished, not what we owned, not the titles before our names or the letters after them.
SPEAKER_00: Hopefully, what remains is that we took what God placed in our hands and gave it away.
SPEAKER_00: Because everything is a gift, everything is grace.
SPEAKER_00: And the greatest legacy any Christian can leave behind is very simple.
SPEAKER_00: Because I was here, someone came to know and love and serve Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.