Evangelize everyone, with preferential love for the poor, says Pope

May 09, 2014

In a May 9 audience with staff of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples and the national directors of the Pontifical Mission Societies, Pope Francis said that evangelization proceeds from an encounter with Christ and that the Church’s evangelizing efforts must reach everyone.

“To evangelize, in this time of great social transformation, requires a missionary Church,” he said. “For a world in transformation we need a Church renewed and transformed by contemplation and personal contact with Christ, by the power of the Spirit. It is the Spirit of Christ, the font of renewal, who makes us find new ways, new creative methods, various forms of expression for the evangelization of the current world.”

Evangelization is “called to reach everyone,” and its point of departure is “the last, the poor,” Pope Francis continued. “The Church is the people of the Beatitudes, the home of the poor, the afflicted, the excluded and persecuted, of those who hunger and thirst for justice.”

The Pope called upon those assembled to work “with preferential love for the poor, keeping the doors of the Church open.”

 

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Further information:

• Udienza ai partecipanti all’Incontro delle Pontificie Opere Missionarie (Holy See Press Office)
• To the Pontifical Mission Societies: Evangelisation Must Start with the Least Among Us (VIS)