World Mission Day: ‘there is an urgent need for missionaries of hope’
Pope releases his message for this year’s World Missionary Day (WMD), which usually falls on the third Sunday of October, titled “We cannot but speak about what we have seen and heard” (Acts 4:20). “To be ‘in a state of mission’ is a reflection of gratitude” towards the encounter wit Jesus Christ. The first Christians turned “problems, conflicts and difficulties into opportunities for mission.” “In these days of pandemic, [. . .] there is urgent need for the mission of compassion” to overcome “the worst kind of skepticism: ‘Nothing changes, everything stays the same.’” The pope urges the faithful to pray for missionary vocations. “He addresses this call to everyone, and in different ways.”
Vatican City (AsiaNews) – Pope Francis today released his Message for World Mission Day 2021, which falls on the third Sunday in October. This is unusual because the Pope’s multilingual message is normally published before Pentecost, around May.
In it, the pontiff says that “there is an urgent need for missionaries of hope”, a plea taken from the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 4:20): “It is impossible for us not to speak about what we have seen and heard.” For the Pope, Christians “cannot but speak” because they had a full and definitive encounter so that their mission becomes irrepressible.
“Love is always on the move, and inspires us to share a wonderful and hope-filled message: ‘We have found the Messiah’” (Jn 1:41).” From this comes “the miracle of gratuitousness, the gratuitous gift of self, blossom. Nor can missionary fervour ever be obtained as a result of reasoning or calculation. To be ‘in a state of mission’ is a reflection of gratitude”.
Looking at the Acts of the Apostles shows that the life of the early Christians was not easy for it entailed “Experiences of marginalization and imprisonment combined with internal and external struggles”. But “those experiences impelled them to turn problems, conflicts and difficulties into opportunities for mission. Limitations and obstacles became a privileged occasion for anointing everything and everyone with the Spirit of the Lord. Nothing and no one was to be excluded from the message of liberation.”
They developed the “’conviction that God is able to act in any circumstance, even amid apparent setbacks’ and in the certainty that ‘all those who entrust themselves to God will bear good fruit’.” This seems to be the core of the message for it touches the present. “The same holds true for us: our own times are not easy. The pandemic has brought to the fore and amplified the pain, the solitude, the poverty and the injustices experienced by so many people. It has unmasked our false sense of security and revealed the brokenness and polarization quietly growing in our midst.
“Those who are most frail and vulnerable have come to feel even more so. We have experienced discouragement, disillusionment and fatigue; nor have we been immune from a growing negativity that stifles hope. For our part, however, ‘we do not proclaim ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as your slaves for Jesus’ sake’ (2 Cor 4:5).”
“As a result, in our communities and in our families, we can hear the powerful message of life that echoes in our hearts and proclaims: ‘He is not here, but has risen’ (Lk 24:6)! This message of hope shatters every form of determinism and, to those who let themselves be touched by it, bestows the freedom and boldness needed to rise up and seek with creativity every possible way to show compassion, the ‘sacramental’ of God’s closeness to us, a closeness that abandons no one along the side of the road.
“In these days of pandemic, when there is a temptation to disguise and justify indifference and apathy in the name of healthy social distancing, there is urgent need for the mission of compassion, which can make that necessary distancing an opportunity for encounter, care and promotion.”
The mercy that comes from encountering Christ generates “solidarity” and “passion” for the common good, overcoming “the worst kind of skepticism: ‘Nothing changes, everything stays the same.’”
The message’s final point is “An invitation to each of us” for “each of us to ‘own’ and to bring to others what we bear in our hearts.” Without such a personal missionary élan, “Our life of faith grows weak, loses its prophetic power and its ability to awaken amazement and gratitude when we become isolated and withdraw into little groups. By its very nature, the life of faith calls for a growing openness to embracing everyone, everywhere.
For this reason, “gratitude” is important towards the Christians in the Acts of the Apostles, as well as towards the missionaries of today, i.e. “all those who resolutely set out, leaving home and family behind, to bring the Gospel to all those places and people athirst for its saving message.”
“Contemplating their missionary witness, we are inspired to be courageous ourselves and to beg ‘the Lord of the harvest to send out labourers into his harvest’ (Lk 10:2). [. . .] He addresses this call to everyone, and in different ways.”
“To be on mission is to be willing to think as Christ does, to believe with him that those around us are also my brothers and sisters. May his compassionate love touch our hearts and make us all true missionary disciples.
“May Mary, the first missionary disciple, increase in all the baptized the desire to be salt and light in our lands (cf. Mt 5:13-14).”
For the full text of the message, in different languages, see attachment:
 | VAT-B0056-XX.01-.pdf |
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