PARISHES WELCOME EVERYONE BECAUSE NOBODY IS A FOREIGNER

VATICAN CITY, FEB 20, 1999 (VIS) - Made public today was a message from the Pope for the 85th World Migration Day. This day is celebrated in local churches on the date established by a country's episcopal conference.

"The presence of migrants," he writes, "calls for the responsibility of believers as individuals and as a community. A privileged expression of the community is the parish" which "welcomes all without discrimination, because no one is a foreigner to her."

"Where the sense of parish is alive, the differences between natives and strangers lessen or disappear, because the awareness of us all belonging to God, and one Father, prevails. From the very mission of each parish community and its importance in society emerges the importance which the parish has in the welcome of foreigners, and in the integration of baptized people from different cultures and in dialogue with believers from other religions."

John Paul II writes in the message dated February 2 that parishes are "visible points of reference, easily found and accessible, and very often are a sign of hope and fraternity between social problems, tension and outbreaks of violence."

"Against insecurity, (the parish) offers a place of trust where one learns to overcome fear; faced with the absence of reference points from which to have light and encouragement to live together, it presents, from the Gospel of Christ, a path of fraternity and reconciliation."

The Holy Father also refers to the imbalance between rich and poor countries, and asks that, "in order for this not to be irreversible, with tragic consequences for humanity," there might be a review of "the indebtedness of poor countries to rich countries."

"I truly hope that the forthcoming Jubilee ... might be a favorable occasion to find fitting solutions and offer new conditions of dignity and organized development to poor countries."

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