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Rome (Agenzia Fides) - If Christian communities look only at themselves, instead of bringing the word of Jesus to everyone, "they end up dying". While the Gospel, meeting different peoples and cultures, "is given back to us every day in its newness and freshness", creating dialogue and friendship with those who profess other religions, recognizing themselves as "children of the one Father ", said Pope Francis on Thursday, October 13, to the members of the Pontifical Institute for Foreign Missions (PIME) in the Clementine Hall of the Apostolic Palace, on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the “Mondo e Missione” magazine. In his speech, starting from the missionary realities and stories told by the magazine in its long history, the Bishop of Rome again suggested that the action of the Holy Spirit is the source of every authentic apostolic work: " In what continue to be considered "peripheries", - the Pope said - missionaries have often discovered that the Holy Spirit had arrived before them. Those who had left to evangelize found themselves receiving Good News most of the time. Like the disciples of Jesus, sent two by two to preach among the poor and the little ones, so too the missionaries of yesterday and today often encounter the joy and new life that the Gospel is capable of generating. It is not possible to keep an experience like this for oneself ". Referring to the long journey made by Mondo e Missione, the Pontiff focused on historical details that attest to how missionary information is done not to promote a product or a strategy, but for the desire to tell the experiences of faith, hope and charity that shine in the great missionary adventure of the Church. "The magazine", recalled the Pope, "was created to respond to a need of the people of God: many wanted to read the stories of the missionaries ". Many wanted "to feel close to them and their works, to accompany them with prayer. And they also wanted to know the countries and cultures in a different way from the more common one - at that time imbued with a colonial mentality -: with a Christian gaze, respectful and attentive to the "seeds" of truth and good scattered throughout the world". For many years, the letters and chronicles of the missionaries "have accurately portrayed the contexts and the lives of the people they came into contact with". And still today the reportages and direct testimonies represent the most characteristic feature of the magazine, thanks to stories from places or situations "that few others speak of". In this regard, the Successor of Peter dwelt in particular on what he called "the forgotten wars", and their victims. "Today - Pope Francis said - we are all worried, and it is good that it is, of a war here in Europe, at the door of Europe and in Europe, but for years there have been wars: more than ten years in Syria, think of Yemen, think of Myanmar, think of Africa. These do not enter, they are not from cultured Europe ... Forgotten wars are a pity, to forget them like this... ". (Agenzia Fides, 13/10/2022)
