the mission is not for free hitters, because it lives of the fraternity

In the Angelus and in the mass with the community of the Democratic Republic of the Congo – country to which he planned to travel today – Francis stopped at the equipment, the message and the style of the missionary. He made a new call for peace in Ukraine and in all other countries: not a world divided between powers in conflict; yes to a united world, in which peoples and civilizations respect each other.

Vatican City () – “The evangelizing mission is not based on personal activism, but on the witness of fraternal love, even through the difficulties of living together”. Pope Francis said this today, addressing the faithful present in St. Peter’s Square for the Angelus prayer.

Commenting on the passage from the Gospel of Luke in which Jesus sends 72 disciples “two by two” to preach in the villages, the pontiff stressed that the mission is not something for “lonely people”. “The disciples -he explained- are not ‘free hitters’, preachers who do not know how to yield the floor to another. It is above all the very life of the disciples that announces the Gospel: the way they are together, their mutual respect, the fact of not wanting to demonstrate that they are more capable than the other, their common reference to the only Master. Perfect pastoral plans can be drawn up -he added-, well-developed projects can be launched, organized down to the smallest detail; crowds can be summoned and of many means; but if there is no availability to fraternity, the evangelical mission does not advance”.

Today, Sunday, the Pope was supposed to travel to Africa, but the trip was postponed due to health problems. Francis first wanted to celebrate Mass in Saint Peter’s Basilica together with the Roman community of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a country that he was going to visit together with South Sudan. In his homily at the celebration, he dwelled on the “three missionary surprises” that Jesus had reserved for the disciples. The first has to do with the equipment: Jesus does not say what to bring, but he does dwell on what they should not bring with them. “We tend to think that our ecclesial initiatives do not work well because we lack structures, money and means: this is not true. And it is Jesus himself who denies it. Let us not place our trust in riches and let us not fear our poverty, material and human. The more free and simple, small and humble we are, the more the Holy Spirit guides the mission and makes us protagonists of its wonders”

Jesus also surprises the apostles with the message that he entrusts to them, just two sentences: “In whatever house you enter, first say: peace to this house”. “Peace – Francis commented – begins with us; with you and me, with the heart of each one. If you live his peace, Jesus comes, and your family, your society changes. They change if, above all, your heart is not at war, if it is not armed with resentment and anger, if it is not divided, if it is not double and false, if you manage to put peace and order in your heart, deactivate greed, extinguish hatred and resentment, flee from corruption, deception and cheating. Peace starts from there”

And then the other content that Jesus entrusts to the apostles before sending them on mission is: “The Kingdom of God is near.” “Hope and conversion – the pontiff pointed out – come from here: from believing that God is near and watches over us. He is the Father of all, he wants us all to be brothers. If we live under this gaze, the world will cease to be a battlefield, to become a garden of peace; history will not be a race to get there first, but a pilgrimage made together”.

Finally, Franciscó referred to the style of the mission: to be “lambs in the midst of wolves.” And he warned that this “does not mean to be naive, but to abhor all instinct of supremacy and arrogance, of greed and possession. He who lives like a lamb does not attack, is not voracious: he stays in the flock, with the others, and finds security in his Shepherd – not in force or arrogance, nor in the greed for money and goods “.

Finally, at the end of the Angelus, as every Sunday, the Pontiff’s thoughts focused on the war. “Let’s continue to pray for peace in Ukraine and around the world,” he said. “I appeal to the leaders of nations and international organizations to react to the tendency to accentuate conflict and opposition.” “The world needs peace. Not a peace based on a balance of arms, on mutual fear.” “The Ukrainian crisis”, he added, “can still become a challenge for wise statesmen, capable of building, in dialogue, a better world for the new generations. With God’s help, this is always possible. But for this we need to move from the strategies of political, economic and military power to a project of global peace: to say “’no’ to a world divided between powers in conflict”; and say “‘yes’ to a united world between peoples and civilizations that respect each other”