PAPAL MESSAGE TO CHARISMATICS MEETING IN ROME

VATICAN CITY, NOV 9, 2002 (VIS) - Made public today was the Holy Father's Message to the Conference of the Catholic Fraternity of Charismatic Covenant Communities and Fellowships, which is currently meeting in Rome and celebrating 35 years of Catholic Charismatic Renewal within the Church.
"Your contribution to the life of the Church," said the Pope's Message, dated November 7, "through your faithful witness to the presence and action of the Holy Spirit has helped many people to rediscover in their own lives the beauty of the grace given to them at Baptism" and "has helped them to know the power of the full outpouring of the Holy Spirit conferred at Confirmation."

"Your reflection on Family Life, Youth and Human Promotion," he added, "cannot fail to open your hearts and minds to the needs of humanity as it struggles to find purpose in a world too often troubled by a 'crisis of meaning'. You are fully aware of the urgency of a new evangelization, an evangelization of culture, in order that life may be marked by hope rather than by fear or skepticism."

Pope John Paul encouraged members "to make your communities living signs of hope" because "to be authentic witnesses to hope means to be authentic witnesses to the truth and vision of life entrusted to and proclaimed by the Church. Communion in faith and life, in heartfelt union with the Successors of the Apostles, is itself a powerful witness to the anchor of truth which the world so needs."

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