Vacation: Time to think, pray and dedicate time to family

VATICAN CITY - Vacation time should be lived as a gift allowing workers and students time to think, pray and dedicate time to family relationships, said the preacher of the papal household.

Capuchin Father Raniero Cantalamessa said it is good to have fun and relax on vacation, but extended free time is rare for most people and they should make the most of it. "It is not that vacations should not also be used for enjoyment and amusement, but they are a gift given in order to discover something; they are not a time to lose or waste, but a time to value to the maximum," the preacher told Vatican Radio June 8. "Vacations should be that time of year when, through contemplating nature and reading the word of God, people can look inside themselves and get in touch with the most important motivations of their lives," particularly their relationships with God and with their families, he said. Father Cantalamessa, speaking in Italian, told Vatican Radio listeners that it was no accident that the British refer to their vacation as holidays, a derivative of "holy days." "Perhaps the most beautiful meaning of vacation is that of getting back into an intimate, profound contact with the root of our being, with God," he said. Pope Benedict XVI made similar remarks about the importance and purpose of vacations while he was in the Italian Alps last year. Vacation time with family is an opportunity to spend "more time dedicated to prayer, reading and meditation on the deep meaning of life," he said in Les Combes, a village in Italy's Valle d'Aosta region. The pope will be in Les Combes from July 11 to 28, according to a Vatican announcement July 5, 2006.

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