Vatican City (Fides Service) - At 8am on Wednesday 24 March 24 at the Propaganda Fide Chapel in Rome Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe, Prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelisation of Peoples (CEP) Sepe, presided Mass for the 12th Day of Commemoration of Missionary Martyrs, promoted by the Youth Movement of the Italian National Office of the Pontifical Mission Societies. The mass was attended by the entire staff of the Congregation. Concelebrating with the Cardinal Prefect, Bishop Anthony K. Adanuty, Bishop of Keta-Akatsi, Ghana, Archbishop Ricardo Guizar Diaz, Archbishop Tlalnepantla Mexico, Archbishop Geraldo Lyrio Rocha, Archbishop of Vitoria da Conquista Brazil and Bishop Vicente Manuel, former Apostolic Vicar of San Jose in Mindoro Philippines, national directors of the Pontifical Mission Societies from various countries, in Rome for a Meeting at the Congregation, as well as CEP staff priests.
At the beginning of the Mass the list of names of 35 missionaries who shed their blood for Christ in 2003 was read out. “A list of names to add to the Martyrology of the Church, which is never complete” Cardinal Sepe said in his homily underlining that martyrdom “is the underlying thread of Church history which sprung from the Hill of Golgotha where the Son of God was martyred. Today the Church still incarnates the reality of the Crucified Lord and continues to experience persecution from Peter, Paul, Stephen down to this day with the martyrdom of so many of her sons and daughters who bear witness to Christ on geographical, cultural and social and religious frontiers in many parts of the world”.
The Cardinal said that those who obey God’s call to go to preach the Gospel to the ends of the earth, “include with their baggage the risk of being sacrificed on the altar of a world studded with hatred, wars, social injustices. But the blood shed is not shed in vain. Their death bears witness to the Risen Christ and it is a sign and an example for all of us and especially for missionaries, men and women, who continue to spend and offer their lives for Christ and for all men and women”.
Cardinal Sepe concluded his homily with a recommendation: “We cannot and we must not forget our missionary martyrs” because they are part of the history of the Church and their testimony, as the Pope said in all the official documents of the Great Jubilee of the Year 2000, is a precious heritage to be preserved and handed down to future generations so they may find nourishment and strength.
(S.L.) (Agenzia Fides 24/3/2004; Righe 31; Parole 432)