Vatican City, Dec 31, 2017 / 09:20 am (CNA/EWTN News).- At Vespers for the close of 2017, Pope Francis said that the only adequate response to God’s gift of His Son Jesus is one of profound gratitude for the many graces we’ve been given, particularly in the last year.

From Mary “the Church has inherited and continuously inherits this inner perception of fullness, which nourishes a sense of gratitude, as the only human response worthy of the immense gift of God,” the Pope said Dec. 31.