As we come to the end of Pope Francis’ trip to the Holy Land, we present an article by Igino Giordani that reveals the great trepidation and expectation that was felt in those truly historic days fifty years ago. The author places Paul VI’s pilgrimage in the context of the Vatican Council, which precisely in those days was concluding the second session of its work. The relevance of his insights and the food for thought he provides is extraordinary, and so in tune with the situation of the Church today. “Pope John XXIII injected a youthful spirit in the ecclesial community, and Paul VI reassumes in a youthful way all the more spiritually innovative contributions, guiding the Council with strength towards life-giving conclusions, for Catholics and non-Catholics, for all the different races, for the baptised, Jews and pagans of every country and caste. His ingenious initiative to go to the Holy Land demonstrates his dedication to building bridges around the world. In Palestine, Bethlehem, Nazareth, Jerusalem, the Pope goes back to the origins: there where Jesus preached the simple truth, in its entirety, the great new commandment, where he instituted the sacraments and gave his life so that we might have life. There, in that birthplace of our religion, there are no differences between Christians: these came later. In the Cenacle, together with Peter and Mary, the faithful had one heart and one soul: they listened to the testament spoken by Jesus under that roof, so that “all may be one.” And in a certain sense, there are no differences either between Christians, Jews and Muslims, as for all three those places are sacred. Paul VI went to pray, in churches and at monuments, which men have made symbols of discord, turning memories of peace and forgiveness to news of armed conflict and hateful fratricide. And instead the Holy Father goes to ask for inspiration to reawaken the forces of renewal and unity, at the Cenacle, where Jesus first proclaimed the law of unity and where the Holy Spirit gave life to the first Church, and with that unity, fruit of the renewal of the spirits, peace, re-presented to the eyes of the world by Pope John XXIII’s Encyclical Pacem in Terris. “We shall see that holy ground, from whence Peter departed and where none of his successors has yet returned – Paul VI wrote: we humbly and very briefly return there in an attitude of prayer, of penance and of spiritual renewal to offer to Christ his Church, to call to it, one and holy, our separated brothers and sisters, to implore divine mercy in favour of peace on Earth, which still seems in these days very weak and unstable, to supplicate Christ the Lord for the salvation of the whole of humanity”. And therefore the aims of his pilgrimage are the same aims as the Council, which in the person of the Pope transfers temporarily to Palestine: renewal, unity, peace … His pilgrimage, of prayer and penitence, all purely religious reasons, signals the will of the Church of the poor to put itself back on the foundation of the evangelical virtues, in great humility, that humility which in the house of Nazareth found its most pure expression and its most moving exultation in the “Magnificat of the Handmaid of the Lord”. From that foundation charity blossomed: Christ, who gives love and asks for love: “Do you love me more than they? …” This greater love of Peter’s, explains Paul VI’s act of humility when he asked forgiveness of the separated brothers and sisters should there have been faults on the Catholic side, in his speech to the Catholic observers at the Council. To return to the origins (…) is to regain strength: to be reborn”.