BARNABITES WELCOMED BY POPE DURING GENERAL CHAPTER

VATICAN CITY, JUL 8, 2000 (VIS) - This morning in the Hall of Popes, the Holy Father met with 50 participants in the general chapter of the Regular Order of St. Paul, also known as the Barnabites, who are meeting on the theme "Looking to the Future." The order was founded in the 16th century by St. Anthony Mary Zaccaria and housed in the monastery of St. Barnabas in Milan from which they received the name of Barnabites.

The Pope urged them to "reaffirm with joy your fidelity to the spiritual patrimony of your founder" who "lived a demanding spirituality based on 'the madness of the Cross'. ... At a time of general lassitude, St. Anthony Mary Zaccaria revived the faith, promoting an intense life of interior renewal centered on the Crucifix and the worship of the Eucharist, the heart of the life of the Church."

John Paul II recalled that the Barnabites chose St. Paul as their teacher and "assumed the commitment of reforming customs, dedicating themselves with special care to the education of young people and schools and oratories." Still today, he went on, "you feel called to witness to the Gospel of charity to your contemporaries. Love for Jesus, 'the living Crucified', and the desire to embrace all men in charity, without distinction, push you to seek .... new avenues to be living presences in the Church."

"Looking at the vast horizons of the new evangelization," he concluded, "the necessity to proclaim and witness the Gospel message to everyone, without distinction, takes on even greater urgency. ... Indeed, how many people are waiting to know Jesus and His Gospel! How many situations of injustice, of moral and material uneasiness are present in so many parts of the earth!"

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