Vatican City, 10 September 2015 (VIS) – The bishops are witnesses to the risen Christ, educators, spiritual guides and catechists, mystagogues and missionaries, Pope Francis affirmed this morning as he received in audience in the Clementine Hall the new bishops ordained during the past year. They were accompanied by Cardinal Marc Ouellet, P.S.S., prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, and Cardinal Leonardo Sandri, prefect of the Congregation for the Oriental Churches. The following are extensive extracts from the Holy Father’s address.
“Bishops .. are witnesses of the Resurrected Christ. This is your primary and indispensable task. You have been entrusted the preaching of the reality that holds up the entire edifice of the Church. Jesus is risen! … We too will be resurrected with Christ. … This is not an obvious or easy proclamation. The world is so content with … what it is seemingly able to provide that appears useful to suppress the demand for what is definitive. … However, we are assailed by questions, the answers to which can only come from a definitive future. … How can we face our difficult present if our sense of belonging to the community of the Risen Christ fades? Will we be able to remember the greatness of human destiny if there abates in us the courage to subordinate our life to the love that does not die?”.
“I think of great challenges such as globalisation, which brings together those who are distant from each other yet at the same time separates those who are close; I think of the epochal phenomenon of migration that unsettles our times; I think of the natural environment, the garden God gave to us as the habitat for human beings and for other creatures, threatened by short-sighted and often predatory exploitation; I think of the dignity and future of human work, of which entire generations are deprived; I think of the desertification of relationships, a widespread abdication of responsibility … the bewilderment of many young people and the solitude of many elderly. … I do not wish to focus on this agenda of tasks to complete as I do not want to alarm you. … I wish only to offer to you the joy of the Gospel. … Remember always that it is the Gospel that protects you and therefore do not be afraid to go everywhere and to be with those whom God has entrusted to you. … No sphere of human life is excluded from the interest of the heart of the pastor. … Be on your guard against the danger of neglecting the many and singular situations of the members of your flock; do not renounce encounters with them; do not spare preaching of the living Word of the Lord; invite all to the mission”.
Bishops as educators, spiritual guides and catechists
“With those who are at home, who frequent your communities and partake of the Eucharist, I invite you to be educators, spiritual guides and catechists, able to take them by the hand and to lead them up Mount Tabor, guiding them in the knowledge of the mystery they profess. … Do not spare any efforts in accompanying them and do not let them resign themselves to staying on the plain”.
Bishops as mystagogues
“I think of baptised people who do not however respond to the demands of their Baptism. Perhaps it has long been thought that the land on which the seed of the Gospel falls is not in need of care. Some have drifted away as they are disillusioned by the promises of faith or perhaps because the path to realising them has appeared too challenging. Some instead leave, slamming the door behind them, holding our weaknesses against us or seeking, while not entirely successfully, to convince themselves that they had been deceived by hopes that were ultimately dashed. Be bishops able to intercept their path. … Do not be scandalised by their pain or their disappointments. Enlighten them with a humble flame … always able to illuminate those who are reached by its light that is, however, never blinding. Devote time to meeting them on the road to their Emmaus. Offer them words that show to them what they are still unable to see: the hidden potential of their very delusions. … More than with words, warm their hearts by humbly listening, interested in what is truly good for them, so that they open their eyes and are able to reverse course, returning to Him, from Whom they had drifted.
Bishops as missionaries
“As pastors and missionaries of God’s gratuitous salvation, seek also those who do not know Jesus or have simply refused Him. Go in their direction … without fear or unease. … It is not true that we can do without these distant brothers. It is not permissible for us to dispense with our concerns about their fate. … Seeing in us the Lord Who calls to them, perhaps they will have the courage to respond to the divine invitation. If so, our communities will be enriched by what they have to share and our Pastors’ hearts will rejoice to repeat once more, “Today salvation has come to this house”….
Vatican City, 10 September 2015 (VIS) – This morning in the Paul VI Hall the Pope received in audience the participants in the International Meeting of the Equipes Notre Dame (Teams of Our Lady, END), held in Rome on the theme, “Here I am Lord, send me”. The Equipes are a lay movement focusing on married spirituality, established in response to the needs of couples to live fully the sacrament of marriage, using its own method and exploring the complex reality of married couples today. The END were founded in France in 1938 upon the initiative of a number of couples and the priest Fr. Henri Caffarel, whose cause for beatification has been received in Rome.
Recalling the upcoming Synod on the family, Francis invited the members of the END to pray for the Synod Fathers and for what they must reflect upon in the assembly on the “vital cell of our societies … in the difficult current cultural context”, and devoted his discourse primarily to the missionary role of the Equipes Notre Dame.
“Christian couples and families are often in the best position to announce Jesus Christ to other families, to support them, to strengthen and encourage them. What you live in the couple and the family – accompanied by the charism typical of your movement – this profound and unique joy that the Lord enables you to experience in the intimacy of domestic life, between joy and suffering, you must bear witness to … so that others, in turn, take the same path”.
The Pope encouraged all the couples to live deeply the “concrete aspects of commitment” of the movement, such as prayer in couples and in the family, a “beautiful and necessary tradition that has always supported the faith and hope of Christians, and unfortunately abandoned in many regions of the world”. He also emphasised the importance of monthly dialogue between spouses, “that well-known and challenging ‘need to sit down’ that is counter to the habits of our frenetic and agitated world riven with individualism”. Finally, participation in the life of a team brings “the wealth of teaching and sharing, as well as the help and comfort of friendship”. In this respect Francis underlined the mutual fruitfulness of meeting with the accompanying priests, and thanked the couples of the END for the support and encouragement in the ministry of their priests “who always find, in contact with your Equipes and your families, priestly joy, fraternal presence, emotional balance and spiritual paternity”.
The missionary task of the movement is of supreme importance and the Holy Father indicated various fields of action, such as accompanying young couples and forming them in faith before and after marriage, or closeness to wounded families, “of whom there are so many these days, due to unemployment, … health problems, bereavement … the imbalance caused by distance or absence, or a climate of violence. We must have the courage to enter into contact with these families, in a discreet but generous way, materially, humanly and spiritually, in those circumstances in which they are vulnerable”.
Finally, the Pope encouraged couples to “be instruments of the mercy of Christ and the Church towards those whose marriage has failed. Never forget that your conjugal fidelity is a gift from God, and that mercy has been shown to every one of us. A united and happy couple can understand better than any other, from within, the harm and the suffering caused by abandonment, betrayal, and a lack of love. It is necessary, therefore, that you bring your witness and your experience to help Christian communities to discern the real situations in which these people find themselves, to welcome them with their wounds, and to help them to journey in faith and in truth, under the gaze of Christ the Good Shepherd, to take part in the life of the Church in an appropriate way. Nor must you forget the unspeakable suffering of the children who experience these painful family situations….
(Vatican Radio) During his Sunday Angelus last weekend Pope Francis called on parishes and religious communities to take in one migrant family who has fled war and hunger in their own country. He said that welcoming refugee families would be part of the build-up to the upcoming Jubilee Year of Mercy, which will begin this December. Since then Catholics around Europe have been heeding that call. The Jesuit Refugee Service has been contacted by thousands of people eager to host refugees in their homes, provide clothing or offer other help to those in need. JRS France has seen an upsurge in interest from those who want to help. It already runs a project called the “Welcome to France programme” which matches host families with asylum seekers needing short term accommodation. Speaking to Lydia O’Kane, Michel Croc of JRS France says that what he has heard is that “Bishops are organising to transmit this call from the Pope to their parishes and they are building relationships with the cities too.” He goes on to say that with the project they run, those who they welcome “is a friend for us, he is a human being…” Listen
In more than 15 cities in France, JRS matches an asylum seeker to a family or religious community that can host the asylum seeker for up to one month. The guest also rotates to other homes until space is available in a government centre for asylum seekers. Many of those who come to France have fled from countries in the Middle East and Africa. But in Paris many of the asylum seekers that are being assisted are from Afghanistan. Meanwhile, as more and more people over to help, JRS Europe says it’s stepping up its operations. (from Vatican Radio)…