During his weekly general audience this morning at the Vatican, Pope Benedict XVI shared his reflections on Psalm 135 (136). The Holy Father underlined that the Psalm speaks of creation as reflection of God’s beauty. He also spoke about what the good God has done for His people throughout the course of history.

You can download and listen to his catechism as an MP3 file by clicking here. The following is a summary of his message:

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Psalm 135 forms part of the joyous song known in the Hebrew tradition as “the great Hallel”. The Psalmist contemplates the two dimensions of God’s revelation, the cosmic and the historical. The first part of the Psalm, which we considered last Wednesday, praises the Lord for his great works in creation. Today, in the second part of the Psalm, we hear of God’s wondrous deeds in the history of salvation: the exodus of Israel from Egypt, the passing of the Red Sea, and the journey through the desert. These events symbolically represent the passage through evil towards the gift of freedom in the promised land.

The Psalm therefore is a celebration of God’s loving, active and faithful mercy (called hesed in Hebrew). This divine participation in human history culminates in the mystery of the Incarnation. Saint Cyprian, contemplating the great deeds God has accomplished in Christ, invites Christians to praise the Lord for “the many and great benefits of his divine mercy”. This call is a faithful echo of the Psalmist words: “To the God of Heaven give thanks, for his love endures for ever”.