DISCORSO DI SUA SANTITÀ PIO PP. XII
ALLE FAMIGLIE DEI CADUTI DEL SUD AFRICA*

Lunedì, 10 ottobre 1955

We experience more than an ordinary sense of satisfaction today in receiving you. You have made the long journey from South Africa, and a faint shadow of sorrow, We dare say, has followed along with you. Mothers you are or widows or dear ones, of those who fell in battle far from their native land and lie buried in foreign soil; and you have come to pay the homage of undying affection •and abiding memory at their graves. Even as We speak to you, We seem to live over again those long, long years of cruel strife, when pain and grief pressed so heavily on Our paternal heart, and We find it easy, be assured, to sympathize very keenly with your renewed sense of loss.

You will be visiting the monuments and hallowed shrines of Our beloved Rome; and as you enter St. Peter's Basilica, We would ask you to pause for a few moments at the first Chapel on the right. The masterpiece of Michelangelo will tell you the story of another Mother, a valiant Mother, the most perfect model of a mother's pure and ardent love that is forged in the fires of sacrifice and heroic submission to the designs of Divine Providence. It was She who stood beneath the Cross, when death claimed Her Son. During this month of October, the month of the Holy Rosary, the Church particularly tells over in prayerful meditation the joys, the sorrows, the exultant glory of that most blessed of all mothers. You have known some of Her joys, some of Her sorrows. It is Our fervent prayer that you, and the dear ones who have gone before you, may be: granted a share in Her glory.

And when you return to your cherished country of South Africa, carry back with you the affectionate greetings of the Holy Father, who embraces all men in the love of Christ Jesus. As a token of that love and a pledge of heavenly graces We impart to you Our Apostolic Blessing.

*Discorsi e Radiomessaggi di Sua Santità Pio XII, XVII,
 Diciassettesimo anno di Pontificato, 2 marzo 1955 - 1° marzo 1956, p. 291
 Tipografia Poliglotta Vaticana