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| | Homily at St Paul outside the Walls |
 | | Paul's words to the community of Corinth, "by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body" (1 Cor 12: 13), seem to form a counterpoint to Christ's prayer: "As you, Father, are in me, and I in you, I pray that they may be one in us" (Jn 17: 21). |
 | | At the gates of Damascus Paul has, in the power of the Spirit, a most extraordinary experience of the incarnate, crucified and risen Christ and becomes the Apostle of the One who "emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men" (Phil 2: 7). |
 | | In this basilica built in honour of Paul, remembering the words with which the Apostle today has challenged our faith and our hope, "by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body", let us ask Christ to forgive everything in the Church's history which has compromised his plan of unity. |
| www.vatican.va /holy_father/john_paul_ii/homilies/2000/documents/hf_jp-ii_hom_20000118_en.html (1391 words) |
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