O n the occasion of the World Day of the Sick, which we will celebrate on 11th February, the Memorial of the Blessed Virgin of Lourdes, I wish to renew my spiritual nearness to all sick people who are in places of care or are looked after in their families, expressing to each one of them the solicitude and the affection of the whole of the Church. In the generous and loving welcoming of every human life, above all of weak and sick life, a Christian expresses an important aspect of his or her gospel witness, following the example of Christ, who bent down before the material and spiritual sufferings of man in order to heal them.

Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him on the last day”. The Eucharist, is above all ‘medicine of immortality, the antidote for death’ the sacrament of the passage from death to life, from this world to the Father, who awaits everyone in the celestial Jerusalem. The theme this year is, ‘Stand up and go; your faith has saved you’, also looks forward to the forthcoming ‘Year of Faith’ which will begin on 11th October 2012, a propitious and valuable occasion to rediscover the strength and beauty of faith, to examine its contents, and to bear witness to it in daily life.

I wish to encourage the sick and suffering to always find a safe anchor in faith, nourished by listening to the Word of God, by personal prayer and by the Sacraments, while I invite pastors to be increasingly ready to celebrate them for the sick. Following the example of the Good Samaritan and as guides of the flocks entrusted to them, priests should be full of joy, attentive to the weak, the simple and sinners, expressing the infinite mercy of God with reassuring words of hope. To all those who work in the world of health, and to the families who in their relatives see the suffering Face of the Lord Jesus, I renew my thanks and that of the Church. Benedictus PP XVI