THE EUCHARIST: SIGN OF UNITY AND SOURCE OF CHARITY

VATICAN CITY, MAY 29, 1999 (VIS) - The Pope sent a message to Cardinal Antonio Maria Rouco Varela, archbishop of Madrid and president of the Spanish Episcopal Conference, on the occasion of the National Eucharistic Congress at Santiago de Compostela, which opened on May 26 and closes today.

In his message, which is in Spanish, the Holy Father writes that the memory of James the Apostle (Santiago) "reminds us that he was a witness to the institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper, just as he was to the glory of Christ in the Transfiguration and to His anguish in the Garden of Olives."

"The celebration of this National Eucharistic Congress is a clarion call to unity and communion for the whole Church in Spain, a call for a return to the roots of the Christian faith that has made your communities thrive. This is recognized by many other sister Churches worldwide. It is demonstrated by the testimony of your martyrs, the rich spirituality of your saints and the dynamic enterprise of your missionaries, who carried the message of the Gospel from the 'finis terrae' of Compostela to other regions of the globe."

John Paul II adds that "the Eucharist, being a sign of unity and source of charity, ... stimulates us to promote fraternity in a divided world, testifying to God's loving paternity towards everyone."

After highlighting that the Eucharist has been "the secret of the vitality of the Church in your motherland," the Pope makes a call to "trust in the future, in order that Christ, present in the Eucharist, may fortify your resolve and revitalize in all, especially in the young, the commitment to evangelization and the desire for a public and social testimony of Christian life at the end of this century and this millennium."

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