
Pope Francis
Lent 2017: “The Word is a gift. Other persons are a gift”.
Lent 2015: Make your hearts firm (James 5,8)
Lent 2014: He became poor, so that by his poverty you might become rich (cf. 2 Cor 8:9)
Benedict XVI
Lent 2013: “Believing in charity calls forth charity”
Lent 2012: “Let us be concerned for each other, to stir a response in love and good works”
Lent 2011: “You were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him.”
Lent 2010: “The justice of God has been manifested through faith in Jesus Christ”
Lent 2009: “He fasted for forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was hungry”
Lent 2008: “Christ made himself poor for you”
Lent 2007: “They shall look on Him whom they have pierced”
Lent 2006: “Jesus, at the sight of the crowds, was moved with pity”
Saint John Paul II
Lent 2005: “Loving the Lord…means life to you, and length of days…”
Lent 2004: “Whoever receives one such child in my name receives me.”
Lent 2003: “It is more blessed to give than to receive”
Lent 2002: “You received without paying, give without pay”.
Lent 2001: “Love is not resentful”
Lent 2000: “I am with you always, to the close of the age”
Lent 1999: “The Lord will prepare a banquet for all peoples”
Lent 1998: “Come, 0 blessed of my Father, for I was poor, marginalized and you welcomed me!”
Lent 1997: “Come, O blessed of my Father, for I was homeless and you took me in”
Lent 1996: Give them something to eat”
Lent 1995: “The Spirit of the Lord… has anointed me to preach the good news to the poor.”
Lent 1994: “The family is at the service of charity, charity is at the service of the family”
Lent 1992: “Called to share the table of creation”
Lent 1991: Total identification of our Lord Jesus Christ with the poor.
Lent 1990: “I was a stranger and you welcomed me… I was a stranger and you did not welcome me”
Lent 1989: “Give us this day our daily bread”
Lent 1987: “He has filled the hungry with good things, and has sent the rich away empty”
Lent 1986: “Through love be servants of one another”
Lent 1985: “Let all that you do be done in love… The grace of the Lord Jesus will be with you”
Lent 1982: “Who is my neighbour?”
Lent 1981: “Remember, man, you are dust and to dust you will return”
Lent 1980: “For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also”.
Lent 1979: “What has happened to Lent?”
Paul VI
Lent 1978: “Those who believed shared all things in common”
Lent 1977: “it is more blessed to give than to receive”
Lent 1976: “the special period for spiritual reflection”
Lent 1975: “The poor you always have with you”
Lent 1974: “Renewal” and “reconciliation”
Lent 1973: “This, rather, is the fasting that I wish: … sharing your bread with the hungry”