Pope concludes apostolic journey to Africa, urges faithful to evangelize
November 30, 2015
Pope Francis concluded his six-day apostolic journey to Africa with the celebration of Mass in Barthélémy Boganda Stadium in Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic, on November 30.
“All the baptized need to continually break with the remnants of the old Adam, the man of sin, ever ready to rise up again at the prompting of the devil,” he preached. “How often this happens in our world and in these times of conflict, hate and war! How easy it is to be led into selfishness, distrust, violence, destructiveness, vengeance, indifference to and exploitation of those who are most vulnerable.”
“We know that our Christian communities, called to holiness, still have a long way to go,” he continued. “Certainly we need to beg the Lord’s forgiveness for our all too frequent reluctance and hesitation in bearing witness to the Gospel.”
Calling upon the nation’s Catholics to be “artisans of the human and spiritual renewal” in their strife-torn country, the Pope issued a renewed call to evangelization:
Each of us, in his or her heart, can ask the crucial question of where we stand with Jesus, asking what we have already accepted – or refused to accept – in responding to his call to follow him more closely. The cry of “those who bring good news” resounds all the more in our ears, precisely when times are difficult; that cry which “goes out through all the earth... to the ends of the earth.”
And it resounds here, today, in this land of Central Africa. It resounds in our hearts, our families, our parishes, wherever we live. It invites us to persevere in enthusiasm for mission, for that mission which needs new “bearers of good news”, ever more numerous, generous, joyful and holy. We are all called to be, each of us, these messengers whom our brothers and sisters of every ethnic group, religion and culture, await, often without knowing it. For how can our brothers and sisters believe in Christ – Saint Paul asks – if the Word is neither proclaimed nor heard?
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