At the Divine Mercy Mass yesterday, one of the priests said something so profound and beautiful that I immediately dug into my backpack for a pen and paper to write it down. He said: “The [Catholic] Church is not a museum of Saints, it is a hospital for sinners; for we are sick people.” These words struck me so deeply on that day, the very day Pope John Paul was canonized, because of the great efforts made by the former Pontiff to reach out towards those who, at the time in the 1980s and 90s, carried the heavy stigma of AIDS.
Author’s note: Notice in the two images (one of which Pope John Paul is pictured embracing AIDS sufferers during his visit to San Francisco in 1987) above - how the expressions and body language of those around Jesus and Pope John Paul are almost identical.