Love for the poor and divine liturgy go together; love for the poor is liturgy.

- General Audience, 1 October 2008

Christian freedom is never identified with libertinage or with the will to do as one pleases; it is actuated in conformity to Christ and hence in authentic service to the brethren and above all to the neediest.

- General Audience, 1 October 2008

In this is where it appears that the Bible is a book of a people and for a people; an inheritance, a testament handed over to readers so that they can put into practice in their own lives the history of salvation witnessed in the text. There is therefore a reciprocal relationship of vital belonging between the people and the Book: the Bible remains a living Book with the people which is its subject which reads it; the people cannot exist without the Book, because it is in it that they find their reason for living, their vocation and their identity. This mutual belonging between people and Holy Scripture is celebrated in every liturgical ceremony, which, thanks to the Holy Spirit, listens to Christ since it is He who speaks when the Scripture is read in the Church and welcomes the Covenant that God renews with his people.

- Homily, 27 October 2008

[A]nyone who believes they have understood the Scriptures, or at least a part of them, without undertaking to build, by means of their intelligence, the twofold love of God and neighbor, demonstrates that in reality they are still a long way from having grasped its deeper meaning.

- Homily, 27 October 2008

God is not only the object of love, commitment, will and feelings, but also the intellect, which should not be excluded from this. Our thinking must conform to God's thinking.

- Homily, 27 October 2008

If it is true that the Bible is also a literary work, even more, the great code of universal culture, it is also true that it should not be robbed of its divine element, but rather should be read in the same Spirit in which it was written. Scientific exegesis and lection divina are, therefore, both necessary and complementary for seeking, through the literal meaning, the spiritual one, which God wants to communicate to us today.

- Angelus Address, 26 October 2008