Vatican City, Nov 16, 2007 / 07:57 am
Leaders of missionary communities from around the world gathered at the Vatican today to meet with Pope Benedict. During his discussion with the missionaries, he praised the increase in the number of lay faithful involved in evangelization and encouraged the heads of the religious orders to draw inspiration from their founders.
"Your assembly" the Pope told the group "bears eloquent witness to the continuing vitality of the missionary impulse in the Church and the spirit of communion uniting your members ... to the Successor of Peter and his universal apostolic ministry."
Their connection to the Peter’s Successor “remains the criterion and guarantee of the spiritual fruitfulness of all missionary activity,” Benedict XVI explained. Without this unifying connection, a foretaste of “God's plan in Christ for the whole human family” could not be experienced here on earth.
Looking at the worldwide effort to spread the Gospel, the Holy Father pointed to one of several promising signs of renewal over the last few decades. This beacon of hope "has been the growing desire of many lay men and women ... to cooperate generously in the 'missio ad gentes' (to the world). As Vatican Council II stressed, the work of evangelization is a fundamental duty incumbent upon the whole People of God."