In his Ash Wednesday homily at the Basilica of Santa Sabina in Rome, Pope Benedict XVI spoke out about the Christian’s struggle against evil: “Every day, but especially in Lent, Christians face a battle like the one Jesus faced in the desert.” Hence, this liturgical time recalls

that Christian life is a struggle without truce, using the ‘arms’ of prayer, fasting and penance. To fight against evil, against all forms of egoism and hatred… is the ascetic journey which all Christ’s disciples are called to undertake…. Meekly following the divine Master makes Christians witnesses and apostles of peace.

Such an attitude

helps us better to identify what the Christian response must be to the violence that threatens peace in the world: certainly not vengeance, not hatred, nor an escape into false forms of spirituality.

The response of Christ’s followers, said the Pope, must be that of

following the road chosen by Him who, in the face of the evil of His time and of all times, embraced the Cross, following the longer but more effective path of love.

This love “must be translated into concrete gestures toward others, especially toward the poor and needy.” It constitutes one of the

essential elements of the life of Christians, who are encouraged by Christ to be the light of the world so that men and women, seeing their good works, may render glory to God.

The Pope concluded his homily by stressing the importance of this suggestion: “so that we may gain an ever clearer understanding that ‘for the Church, charity is not a kind of welfare activity… but is a part of her nature, an indispensible expression of her very being’ (Deus Caritas Est).”