Vatican City, 4 December 2014 (VIS) –
The image of a Church at work in the service of those in difficulty
is promoted by the Federation of Christian Organisations for
International Volunteer Service (FOCSIV), which seeks to combine the
accumulated experience of its members with the dimension of voluntary
service to the poor in the style of the good Samaritan and according
to Gospel values. Starting from their Christian identity, they are
“volunteers in the world”, offering many development projects to
offer concrete responses to the “scandals” of hunger and war.
Pope Francis emphasised these characteristics in his address to two
thousand members of the federation in the Vatican's Paul VI Hall this
morning.
“Your work alongside men and women in
difficulty is a living announcement of the tenderness of Christ, Who
walks alongside humanity in all times”, affirmed the Pope. “There
is a great need to bear witness to the value of gratuity: the poor
must not become an opportunity for profit! The face of poverty is
changing nowadays, and there are those among the poor who are
developing different expectations: they aspire to be protagonists,
they are organised, and above all they practise that solidarity that
exists between those who suffer, between those who are left behind.
You are called upon to perceive these signs of the times and to
become an instrument of service to assist in enabling leadership
among the poor. Solidarity with the poor means thinking in terms of
community, of the priority of the life of all above the appropriation
of goods by the few. It also means combating the structural causes of
poverty: inequality, unemployment and homelessness, and the denial of
social and working rights. Solidarity is a way of making history with
the poor, avoiding supposedly altruistic works that reduce others to
passivity”.
Among the main causes of poverty,
Francis did not neglect to mention the existence of an economic
system that exploits natural resources. “I think in particular of
deforestation, but also of environmental disasters and the loss of
biodiversity. It is necessary to reaffirm that creation is not
property from which we can derive pleasure and dispose of as we
please, and much less the property of just a few. Creation is a
marvellous gift that God has given us for us to take care of and use
for the benefit of all, with respect. I therefore encourage you to
continue in your commitment to ensuring that creation remains the
patrimony of all, to be handed on in all its beauty to future
generations”.
Many of the countries where the FOCSIV
works are at war, and the Pope emphasised that working for the
development of the people also means cooperating in building peace,
“seeking with tenacious perseverance to disarm minds, to draw
closer to people, to build bridges between cultures and religions.
Faith will help you to do this even in the most difficult countries,
where the spiral of violence no longer seems to leave space for
reason. A sign of peace and hope is your activity in refugee camps,
where you encounter desperate people, faces marked by abuse, children
who hunger for food, freedom and a future. How many people in the
world flee from the horrors of war! How many people are persecuted
for their faith, forced to abandon their homes, their places of
worship, their homelands, their loved ones! How many broken lives!
How much suffering, how much destruction! Faced with all of this, a
disciple of Christ cannot step or turn away, but instead seeks to
take care of this suffering humanity with evangelical closeness and
acceptance”.
The Pope reiterated his concerns for
migrants and refugees, who “seek to flee from hard living
conditions and dangers of every type”, and insisted on the need for
collaboration between “institutions, NGOs and ecclesial
communities, to promote itineraries of harmonious co-existence
between different peoples and cultures. “Migratory movements
require adequate forms of reception that do not leave migrants at the
mercy of the sea and bands of unscrupulous traffickers. At the same
time, there is a need for active collaboration between States to
regulate and effectively manage such phenomena”.
Finally, Francis thanked the volunteers
of the Federation who, for more than forty years, have shown
themselves to be “true witnesses of charity, workers of peace,
builders of justice and solidarity”, and, encouraging them to
continue in their progress, he invited them to find time each day for
a personal encounter with God in prayer. “It will be your strength
in moments of greatest difficulty, disappointment, solitude and
incomprehension”.
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