| Draw light and strength for Christian life from
the Eucharist On Thursday, 11 May, in the Clementine
Hall to the Vatican, the Holy Father received a first group of Canadian
Bishops to make their ad limina visit this year from the
ecclesiastical circumscription of Quebec. The following is a translation
of the Pope's Address, which was given in French.
Your Eminences,
Dear Brothers in the Episcopate,
I am pleased to welcome you, Pastors of the Church in the ecclesiastical
region of Quebec who have come to make your ad limina, visit and to
share your worries and hopes with the Successor of Peter and his
collaborators.
Our meeting is an expression of the deep communion that unites each one
of your Dioceses with the See of Peter. I thank Bishop Gilles Cazabon,
President of the Assembly of Catholic Bishops of Quebec, for presenting
the sometimes difficult context in which you carry out your pastoral
ministry. Through you, I would also like to greet warmly the members of
your Dioceses, the priests, deacons, men and women religious and lay
people, with appreciation for the part that many play in the life of the
Church. May God bless the generous efforts made to proclaim to all the
Good News of the Risen Lord!
With the three other groups of Bishops from your Country, I will have
the occasion to continue my Reflection on important topics for the
Church's mission in Canadian society, marked by pluralism, subjectivism
and increasing secularism.
In 2008, when Quebec will be celebrating its fourth centenary, your
region will host the International Eucharistic Congress. I would also like
first of all to invite your Dioceses to a renewal of the meaning and
practice of the Eucharist, through a rediscovery of the essential place
that "the Eucharist, the gift of God for the life of the world" must have
in the life of the Church. In fact, in your quinquennial reports, you have
stressed the notable decline in religious practice in recent years, noting
in particular that few young people go to Eucharistic gatherings. The
faithful must be convinced that it is vital to take part regularly in
Sunday Mass if their faith is to increase and be expressed coherently.
Indeed, the Eucharist, source and summit of Christian life, unites us
and conforms us to the Son of God. It also builds the Church and
strengthens her unity as the Body of Christ; no Christian community can be
established if it is not founded and centred in the Eucharistic
celebration.
Participation in Sunday Mass
In spite of the ever greater difficulties that you are experiencing. it
is the duty of Pastors to offer to all the effective possibility of
fulfilling the Sunday precept and to invite them to participate. Gathered
in church to celebrate the Pasch of the Lord, the faithful draw from this
Sacrament light and strength in order to live their baptismal vocation to
the full.
Furthermore, the meaning of the Sacrament does not end with the
celebration. In "receiving the Bread of life, the disciples of Christ
ready themselves to undertake with the strength of the Risen Lord and his
Spirit the tasks which await them in their ordinary life" (Dies Domini,
n. 45). Having lived and proclaimed the presence of the Risen One, the
faithful will have at heart to be evangelizers and witnesses in their
daily life.
However, the decline in the number of priests, which sometimes makes
the celebration of Sunday Mass impossible: in certain places,
disconcertingly calls into question the place of sacramentality in the
life of the Church. The needs of pastoral organization must not compromise
the authenticity of the ecclesiology that is expressed in it. The central
role of the priest, who teaches, sanctities and governs the community
in persona Christi capitis, must not be minimized. The ministerial
priesthood is indispensable to the existence of an ecclesial community.
The importance of the role of lay people, whose generous service to the
Christian communities I acknowledge, must never overshadow the ministry of
priests, which is absolutely indispensable to the life of the Church.
Thus, the ministry of the priest cannot be entrusted to others without
damaging the authenticity of the very existence of the Church.
Furthermore, how can young then desire to become priests if the role of
the ordained ministry is not clearly defined and recognized?
Nonetheless, it is always necessary to point out as a real sign of hope
the thirst for renewal that is making itself felt among the faithful. The
World Youth Day events in Toronto have had a positive impact on many young
Canadians. The celebration of the Year of the Eucharist has made a
spiritual awakening possible, especially through the development of
Eucharistic Adoration. The worship of the Eucharist outside of the Mass
but strictly linked to the celebration, is also of great value for the
life of the Church, for it aspires to sacramental and spiritual communion.
As John Paul II wrote, "If in our time Christians must be distinguished
above all by the 'art of prayer', how can we not feel a renewed need to
spend time in spiritual converse, in silent adoration, in heartfelt love
before Christ present in the Most Holy Sacrament?" (Ecclesia de
Eucharistia, n. 25). From this experience we cannot not receive
strength, comfort and support.
Universal vocation to holiness
The life of prayer and contemplation founded on the Eucharistic mystery
is also at the heart of the vocation of consecrated people who have
chosen the path of the sequela Christi, to give themselves to the Lord
with an undivided heart in an ever more intimate relationship with him. By
their unconditional attachment to Christ and to his Church, they have the
special mission to reminding everyone of the universal vocation to
holiness.
Dear Brothers in the Episcopate, the Church is grateful to the
Institutes of Consecrated Life of your Country for the apostolic and
spiritual commitment of their members. This commitment is expressed in
many ways but especially through contemplative life, which causes a
ceaseless prayer of praise and intercession to rise to God, and also in
the generous service of the catechetical and charitable activities of your
Dioceses and closeness to the most underprivileged members of society,
thus manifesting the Lord's bounty to the humble and the poor. It is
through this daily commitment that the search for holiness, which
consecrated people wish to live, matures, particularly through a way of
life different from that of the world and the surrounding culture.
However, through these commitments it is of paramount importance that
while having an intense spiritual life, consecrated men and women
proclaim that God alone can give fullness to human existence.
To help consecrated people live their specific vocation in authentic
fidelity to the Church and to her Magisterium, I therefore ask you to
near special attention to strengthening relations of trust with them and
with their Institutes. Consecrated life is a gift of God for the benefit of
the entire Church and for the service of life in the world. It is therefore necessary that it develop in solid
ecclesial communion.
The challenges that confront the consecrated life can only be faced by
showing profound unity among its
members and with the whole of the Church and her Pastors. I therefore
invite
consecrated people, men and women, to increase their sense of Church and
their concern to work ever more closely with the Pastors, accepting and
spreading the Church's teaching in its integrity and completeness.
Communion requires fidelity
Ecclesial communion, which is based on the person of Jesus Christ
himself, also demands fidelity to the Church's teaching, especially
through a correct interpretation of the Second Vatican Council: in other
words, as I have said before, in "the 'hermeneutic of reform', of renewal
in the continuity of the one subject-Church which the Lord has given to
us" (Christmas Address to the Roman Curia, 22 December 2005;
L'Osservatore Romano English edition, 4 January 2006, p. 5). Indeed, if we read
and receive the Council in this way. "It can be and can become
increasingly powerful for the ever necessary renewal of the Church"
(ibid., p. 6).
The renewal of priestly and Religious vocations must also be a
permanent concern for the Church in your Country. True pastoral care for
vocations will draw strength from the lives of men and women who witness
to passionate love for God and for their brethren, in faithfulness to
Christ and the Church. And one cannot overlook the essential place of
confident prayer in order to create a new sensitivity in the Christian
people that will enable the young to respond to the Lord's call. A
primordial duty for you and for the entire Christian community is to
fearlessly transmit the Lord's call, inspire vocations and accompany young
people on the path of discernment and commitment in the joy of giving
themselves in celibacy. In this spirit, it is your task to be attentive
to the catechesis provided for children and young people, to enable them
to know the truth of the Christian mystery and to have access to Christ.
On this topic I therefore invite the entire Catholic community of
Quebec to renew its adherence to the truth of the Church's teaching with regard to
theology and morals, two inseparable aspects of being Christians in the world. The faithful cannot subscribe to the ideologies
that are spreading in society today without losing their own identity.
Dear Brothers in the Episcopate, at the end of our meeting I would like
to encourage you warmly in your ministry at the service of the
Church in Canada. May the Risen Christ give you joy and peace as you lead
the faithful on the paths of hope, so that they may be authentic Gospel
witnesses in Canadian society. I wholeheartedly impart the Apostolic
Blessing to you all.
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