Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Vatican City (Fides Service) - Pope John Paul II addressed a special message to participants at an International Congress on Consecrated Life in Rome 22 to 27 November. The Message was read at the end of the Congress by the Prefect of the Congregation for Religious Institutes and Societies of Apostolic Life Archbishop Franc Rode.
“Some of the men and women of our day are so inwardly impoverished as to even be unaware of their poverty - the Pope writes in the Message -. Our epoch confronts us with forms of injustice and exploitation, egoistic prevarication of individuals and groups, hitherto unheard of... In this situation consecrated persons are called to offer humanity disoriented, disheartened and without memory, credible witness of Christian hope, making visible the love of God who abandons no one”.
“Faced with a society in which freely given love has difficulty in finding spaces in which to expresses itself, consecrated persons are called to bear witness to the logic of disinterested gift...Consecrated life must be the guardian of a patrimony of life and beauty which quenches all thirst, binds all injuries, is balsam for all wounds, and satisfies all longing for joy, love, liberty and peace.”
The Pope encouraged consecrated men and women “to follow Christ more closely, to have his same sentiments, to learn from Him, meek and humble of heart, to obey with Him the will of the Father, to follow Him along the path of the cross ... In this way the testimony of your life chaste, poor and obedient will reveal the loving face of Christ at this dawn of the third Christian millennium.”
“Your vow of chastity should recall the fecundity of a spousal relationship between creature and Creator, may it be a sign that there exists a space in the human heart which God alone can fill - the Message continues -. Show through your detachment that your whole being tends towards those heavens where " neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal." (Mt 6,20). Be obedient in Christ. May your communities be communities of responsibility where duties of some are not a motive for others to be inert; communities in which discernment, edifying charity and fraternal correction is exercised by all.”
The Holy Father urged Religious to be “ready to respond to the challenges launched to men and women of good will, to individual believers, men and women, to the Church and to society” and to continue to spend themselves for the world, “knowing that the only measure of love is love unlimited”... “Spread this preferential love for those most in need to all to encounter, especially lay persons who ask to share your charisma and your mission. Be ever ready to heed new calls from the Holy Spirit, striving, with the Bishops of the particular Churches where you are called to live, to identify the spiritual and missionary urgencies of the present moment.” (S.L.) (Agenzia Fides 30/11/2004; Righe 35 - Parole 514)
