REAFFIRM CHARISMS OF ECUMENISM, RENEWAL OF CHRISTIAN LIFE

VATICAN CITY, JUL 8, 2000 (VIS) - The Pope received in audience this morning in the Consistory Hall members of the general chapter of the Basilian Order, whose patron and "patriarch" is St. Basil the Great (d.329). The Pope underscored how, for many members of the community, "just ten years have passed since their freedom from oppressive regimes, which were a great deterrent to the life of the Church."

Recalling that the Basilians work mainly among Eastern rite Catholics, the Holy Father pointed to one of the primary scopes of the Basilian order, "the renewal of the Christian life of your people, an end to which St. Josaphat worked so diligently. ... We are approaching the 400th anniversary of his entrance into the monastery of the Most Holy Trinity in Vilnius. The start of a new springtime of monastic life in the Greek-Catholic Church goes back to that very time." St. Josaphat "contributed efficaciously to the rebirth not only of monasticism but also of Christian life in those lands. An analogous situation is repeated today in those places where, for many decades, the Church was suppressed."
Turning to the charism of the Order of St. Basil the Great, John Paul II said that "it rests on several essential points: community life, a clear manifestation of the evangelical life, service to the unity of the Church of Christ as expressed in study, example and, above all, in personal prayer and liturgy, the multiform apostolate for the people of God through spiritual formation, and pastoral, catechetical, missionary, scholastic and editorial activities." He pointed out that St. Basil knew how to balance "tireless preaching with spaces for solitude and ample time for prayer." He was, "in the fullest sense of the term, a monk."

The Pope urged the Basilians to remain dedicated to their service to ecumenism, to St. Basil's "call to the precept of love for God and for one's brothers," and to making liturgy their "continual reference point. Faithfully adhering to the legacy of the past, which knows how to open itself to a healthy creativity according to the great spirit of liturgical prayer, will be a guarantee of the perseverance of your Oriental religious identity."

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