VATICAN - At his General weekly Audience the Pope teaches on Psalm 129: “God is not an inexorable sovereign who condemns the guilty, instead he is a loving father whom we should love not for fear of punishment, but because of his goodness and readiness to forgive”.

Vatican City (Fides Service) - “This is one of the most famous and loved psalms for Christian tradition: the ‘De profundis’, called after its opening words in Latin with the ‘Miserere’ has become a favourite penitential psalm for popular devotion. Apart from its funeral use, the text its first of all a hymn to divine mercy and reconciliation between the sinner and the Lord, a God who is just but always ready to show he is merciful and full of pity …”. Pope Benedict XVI said this at the beginning of his catechesis this morning Wednesday 19 October in St Peter’s square when he reflected on psalm 129 (“Out of the depths I dry to thee O Lord” - 1st vespers Sunday week 4: Ps 129, 1-6).
“Psalm 129 opens with a voice rising from the depths of evil and guilt” to then develops in three moments dedicated to the theme of sin and forgiveness, the Pope explained . “It is significant that what generates fear and an attitude of respect mixed with love is not punishment, but forgiveness. More than God’s anger, his generous and disarming magnanimity should prompt us to have holy fear. In fact God is not an inexorable sovereign who condemns the guilty, instead he is a loving father whom we should love not for fear of punishment, but because of his goodness and readiness to forgive.”
At the centre of the second moment “the heart of the penitent psalmist is filled with expectancy, hope and certainty that God will pronounce the liberating word and remove the sin”. The third part of the psalm extends to all Israel: “The personal salvation for which the psalmist implored earlier is now extended to the whole community … from the shadowy gorge of sin, the supplication of the De profundis ascends to the bright horizon of God, reign of ‘mercy and redemption’, two important characteristics of the God of love”.
The Pope ended his teaching quoting Saint Ambrose with regard to reasons for asking God’s forgiveness. After the audience the Pope blessed a new statue of Saint Mariana de Jesús Paredes y Flores, first saint of Ecuador. The statue has been placed among others in outside niches of St Peter’s Basilica. (S.L.) (Agenzia Fides 19/10/2005, righe 24, parole 361)