Speak about God and communicate Christian hope, Vatican cardinals tell leaders of lay movements

June 06, 2025

Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Secretary of State of His Holiness, and Cardinal Kevin Farrell, prefect of the Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life, addressed the leaders of the of 115 recognized lay associations and movements, who have gathered in Rome for their annual meeting with officials of the dicastery.

Cardinal Pietro Parolin, the Secretary of State of His Holiness, celebrated Mass in St. Peter’s Basilica on June 5.

L’Osservatore Romano reported that Cardinal Parolin “emphasized how ‘unity and love’ are the two ‘distinctive realities of every Christian community’: ‘revelatory signs’ and ‘missionary signs.’ Both speak of God and ‘attract towards God.’“

Unless Christians “live” the unity between the Father and the Son, “the Christian community is limited to being just a group of friends like many others,” Cardinal Parolin warned.

Unless Christians speak about God, he continued, the good that Christians do “is reduced to charity, ethical voluntarism, and human effort of solidarity,” rather than manifesting “divine charity, fruit of the Holy Spirit poured into our hearts.”

“Today, too, your groups are called to offer the men and women of this age the opportunity to find in Christ the true hope that illuminates life,” Cardinal Farrell said in an earlier address to the lay movement leaders. “Today, too, missionary initiatives must arise from your groups to communicate to the world the hope they have encountered. Today, too, young people must be trained to become men and women of hope in a world often crushed by despair and cynicism.”

 

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Further information:

• Testimoni di unità e amore (L'Osservatore Romano)
• Lay movement leaders meet at Vatican to discuss evangelization, formation (CWN)
• Rediscovering and proclaiming hope again (Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life)