The mission at the heart of the Christian faith.

9th Missionary Day

 Let us always remember that, "at the beginning of being Christian, there is not an ethical decision or a great idea, but an encounter with an event, with a Person who gives life a new horizon and, in this way, a decisive direction." The Gospel is a Person who continually offers Himself and, to those who welcome Him with humble and active faith, continually invites them to share in His life through effective participation in His paschal mystery of death and resurrection.

The world has an essential need for the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He, through the Church, continues his mission of... Good Samaritan, healing the bloody wounds of humanity, and its mission of Good Shepherd, ...relentlessly searching for those who have strayed down crooked and dead-end paths. And, thank God, there is no shortage of significant experiences that testify to the transformative power of the Gospel.

The mission inspires a spirituality of continuous exodus, pilgrimage, and exile.

The mission of the Church is animated by a spirituality of continuous exodus. It is about "leaving one's own comfort zone and having the courage to reach all the peripheries that need the light of the Gospel." The mission of the Church encourages an attitude of continuous pilgrimage through the various deserts of life, through the various experiences of hunger and thirst for truth and justice. The mission of the Church inspires an experience of continuous exile, to make man, thirsting for the infinite, feel his condition as an exile on the way to his ultimate homeland, hovering between the "already" and the "not yet" of the Kingdom of Heaven.

The mission warns the Church that it is not an end in itself, but an instrument and mediation of the Kingdom. A self-referential Church, which delights in earthly successes, is not the Church of Christ, his crucified and glorious body. For this very reason, it is preferable "a Church that is bruised, wounded and dirty from being out on the streets, than a Church that is sick from being confined and clinging to its own securities.".

 (Pope Francis, message for the year 2017)