” “"In Jesus Christ, the incarnate Word, we come to understand the grandeur of our own humanity, the mystery of our life on this earth and the sublime destiny that awaits us in heaven", Benedict XVI went on to say. "We are God’s creatures, made in His image and likeness, endowed with an inviolable dignity and called to eternal life. Wherever man is diminished, the world around us is also diminished; it loses its ultimate meaning and strays from its goal. What emerges is a culture not of life, but of death". It is not a matter of a step of progress: "On the contrary, it is a backward step, a form of regression, which ultimately dries up the very sources of life for individuals and all of society". "The only real "standard" against which all human reality can be measured", repeated the Pope, "is the Cross": a way of "difficult" consecration, which "demands a continual ‘conversion’, a sacrificial death to self which is the condition for belonging fully to God, a change of mind and of heart which brings true freedom and a new breadth of vision". (continues)” “
