Francis, a new exhortation on Sanctity is on its way
It will be signed on 19 March, on the fifth anniversary of the beginning of his pontificate and will speak of the call for all to become saints by witnessing evangelical joy in everyday affairs
St. Peter Square
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Pubblicato il 02/03/2018
Ultima modifica il 02/03/2018 alle ore 15:25
ANDREA TORNIELLI
VATICAN CITY
Pope Francis’ new apostolic exhortation dedicated to the theme of Sanctity will probably be signed on 19 March, feast of Saint Joseph and fifth anniversary of the inauguration of his pontificate. Wednesday 28 February, during the presentation of Fabio Marchese Ragona’s book “Tutti gli uomini di Francesco”, Cardinal Oscar Rodriguez Maradiaga, coordinator of the Council of nine cardinals who collaborate with the Pope for the reform of the Curia and the government of the universal Church, made a brief mention of it. “I have barely heard a distant voice - the Honduran cardinal said - that says the Pope is preparing a beautiful document on Sanctity. We are all called to Sanctity, if we do not listen to this call the reform cannot go".
The document, due to the time required for translation, will probably not make it in time for March 19, day marking the fifth anniversary of the beginning of the pontificate, which was inaugurated with a mass in St. Peter's Square. It will be most likely published later, around Easter. According to what Maradiaga affirmed, the main object of the exhortation - which should be shorter compared to the earlier and more extensive Evangelii gaudium, the road-map of the pontificate (2013) and Amoris laetitia (2016) - is sanctity and vocation, the call to holiness for all baptized. A theme contained in Chapter V of the Council Constitution Lumen Gentium: Pope Francis has already drawn inspiration on several occasions from here for his catechesis and also for his teachings on the "holy and faithful people of God" so central to his interventions.
On November 19, 2014, at the general audience, Pope Francis addressed the theme of universal vocation to holiness called for by the Council, explaining that first of all, "Sanctity is not something we can procure for ourselves, that we can obtain by our own qualities and abilities. Sanctity is a gift, it is a gift granted to us by the Lord Jesus, when He takes us to Himself and clothes us in Himself, He makes us like Him”. Sanctity, Bergoglio said, "is not as a prerogative of the few: sanctity is a gift offered to all, no one excluded, by which the distinctive character of every Christian is constituted ". And to be Saint, "there is no need to be bishops, priests or religious " or for “those who have the opportunity to break away from daily affairs in order to dedicate themselves exclusively to prayer".
Sanctity, Francis continued to explain," is something greater, deeper, which God gives us. Indeed, it is precisely in living with love and offering one'’ own Christian witness in everyday affairs that we are called to become saints. And each in the conditions and the state of life in which he or she finds him- or herself. But you are consecrated. Are you consecrated? — Be a saint by living out your donation and your ministry with joy. Are you married? — Be a saint by loving and taking care of your husband or your wife, as Christ did for the Church. Are you an unmarried baptized person? — Be a saint by carrying out your work with honesty and competence and by offering time in the service of your brothers and sisters.”
The Pope said, "When the Lord invites us to become saints, he doesn’t call us to something heavy, sad... quite the contrary! It’s an invitation to share in his joy, to live and to offer with joy every moment of our life, by making it become at the same time a gift of love for the people around us". The call to joy is a reference to both Evangelii gaudium and Amoris laetitia. This year, as Francis himself announced, will be celebrated the canonization of Paul VI, the Pope who on 9 May 1975 published an apostolic exhortation dedicated to Christian joy, Gaudete in Domino.
Pope Bergoglio has made numerous references during these five years on the importance and centrality of the "holy and faithful people of God". In particular, he did so in the letter (dated 19 March 2016) sent to Cardinal Marc Ouellet, President of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America. In that text Francis wrote, "Our role, our joy, a pastor’s joy, lies precisely in helping and in encouraging, as many have done before us: mothers, grandmothers and fathers, history’s real protagonists. Not through our concession of good will, but by right and actual statute. Lay people are part of the faithful Holy People of God and thus are the protagonists of the Church and of the world; we are called to serve them, not to be served by them.”
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