Vatican City, Mar 19, 2018 / 12:17 pm
Pope Francis marked Monday's Solemnity of St. Joseph by ordaining three new bishops, telling them prayer is a primary ecclesial duty, and if they do not maintain a strong spiritual life, they are not fulfilling their vocation.
"Announce the Word in every occasion: opportune and inopportune. Admonish, rebuke, exhort with all magnanimity and doctrine. And through the prayer and sacrificial offering of your people, draw from the fullness of the holiness of Christ the manifold richness of divine grace," the Pope said March 19.
Prayer, he said, "is the first task of a bishop. A bishop who doesn't pray does not fulfill his duty, he does not fulfill his vocation."
Francis celebrated Mass in St. Peter's Basilica on the March 19 feast of St. Joseph, which also marks the fifth anniversary of the inauguration of his papacy.