Six new Beatitudes proposed by Pope Francis

The Pope has offered a new list of Beatitudes at a Catholic Mass in Malmo, Sweden.

At the Mass, which took place at the conclusion of his ecumenical trip to the country, Pope Francis highlighted the lives of the Swedish saints Elizabeth Hesselblad and Bridget of Vadstena.

The best description of the saints, their “identity card”, the Pope said, is found in the Beatitudes from Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount, which begins, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.”

New situations require new energy and a new commitment, he said, and then offered a new list of Beatitudes for modern Christians:

— Blessed are those who remain faithful while enduring evils inflicted on them by others and forgive them from their heart.

— Blessed are those who look into the eyes of the abandoned and marginalised and show them their closeness.

— Blessed are those who see God in every person and strive to make others also discover him.

— Blessed are those who protect and care for our common home.

— Blessed are those who renounce their own comfort in order to help others.

— Blessed are those who pray and work for full communion between Christians.

Reflecting the multicultural makeup of the Catholic Church in Sweden and the rest of Scandinavia, the prayer intentions at Mass were read in Spanish, Arabic, English, German and Polish, as well as in Swedish.