Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Castel Gandolfo (Agenzia Fides) - "Today we live in an era of a new evangelization. Wide horizons open to the proclamation of the Gospel, while the regions of ancient Christian tradition are called to rediscover the beauty of faith. The protagonists of this mission are men and women who, like St. Paul, can say: 'For me to live is Christ'. "These are the words spoken by Pope Benedict XVI before the Angelus prayer on Sunday 18 September, together with the Pilgrims gathered in the courtyard of the Apostolic Palace of Castel Gandolfo. Referring to the letter that St. Paul wrote to members of the Philippi community, an important Roman colony in Macedonia, where Paul came on his second missionary journey, the Pope stressed that "this was the first time when the gospel came to Europe" and that "St. Paul was a man who summed up the three worlds: the Jewish, the greek and the Roman. It is no coincidence that God entrusted him the mission of bringing the Gospel from Asia Minor to Greece and then Rome, building a bridge that would have shown Christianity to the ends of the earth".
Benedict XVI then highlighted that the death and resurrection of Jesus is "the good news that, starting from Jerusalem, is intended to reach all people and nations, and to transform from within all cultures, opening them to the fundamental truth: God is love, became man in Jesus and through his sacrifice redeemed humanity from the slavery of evil giving it trustworthy hope. "Thus, before the Marian prayer, he recalled that" the Gospel has transformed the world, and is still doing it, like a river that irrigates a huge field", asking the Virgin Mary that "priestly, religious and lay vocations mature throughout the Church in order to serve the new evangelization". (SL) (Agenzia Fides 19/09/2011)
