Pope Francis says "The lay faithful announces the good news, fundamentally trusting in the ecclesial and supernatural dimension of their mission..." to Latin American Church

 SPEECH OF THE HOLY FATHER FRANCIS
TO THE MEMBERS OF THE PLENARY ASSEMBLY OF THE
PONTIFICAL COMMISSION FOR LATIN AMERICA
Thursday, June 27, 2024
________________________________________
Dear brothers and sisters:
I am happy to meet the members and councilors of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, which is holding its Plenary Assembly. I appreciate the words of Cardinal Robert Prevost. I cordially greet the members, guests, and the team that works daily from the Holy See at the service of the Church in the region.
The three questions that you will try to answer in these days of work are very relevant: what practices to promote in relation to development in the region “touching the suffering flesh of Christ in the people”?; How to evangelize the social by promoting fraternity in the face of the phenomenon of polarization? What service should the CAL provide to the episcopal conferences, to CELAM and to the dicasteries of the Holy See?
If we look closely, all of them not only address issues that the current reality forces us to face, but are part of the synodal reform that the entire Church must embrace to make the true face of Jesus Christ more and better transparent.
Indeed, the Second Vatican Council has called us to a profound renewal. This is manifested in the speeches given by Saint John XXIII and Saint Paul VI at the beginning of the first and second periods of the Council's work. The first spoke of aggiornamento (Saint John XXIII, Address at the opening of the Second Vatican Council, October 11, 1962, 4). The second of “flourishing renewal of the Church” (Saint Paul VI, Address at the opening of the Second Session of the Second Vatican Council, September 29, 1963). Even the Decree on Ecumenism of the Second Vatican Council itself boldly states that "Christ calls the pilgrim Church towards a perennial reform, of which the Church itself, as a human and earthly institution, always has need" (n. 6). .
In this same vein, I like to remember the incisive words of Cardinal Ratzinger when he thought about the “true reform” of the Church: «Reform – I quote – is always an ablatio: a removal, so that the nobilis forma, the face of the Bride, and with it also that of the Bridegroom, the living Lord. Such ablatio, such “negative theology,” represents a path toward a very positive goal. Only in this way does the Divine penetrate and only in this way does a congregation arise, an assembly, a meeting, a purification, that pure community that we long for: a community in which one 'I' is no longer against another 'I'" (Being a Christian in the neopagan era, Madrid 1995, 19).
Through the Constitution Praedicate evangelium I have precisely wanted to collaborate with this “ablatio” to renew the Roman Curia and, among other things, make the CAL a “diakonía” that allows the Church in Latin America to experience pastoral care and affection of the Successor of Peter (cf. Video message to the Plenary Assembly of the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, May 27, 2022).
However, the CAL is currently not only a case of the renewal of the Roman Curia but is called to be an active subject that promotes the necessary transformation that we all need, that is, to help with discretion, prudence and effectiveness so that we live the synodality—dynamic dimension of communion (cf. Ibidem)—to walk together moved by the Spirit of the Lord in Latin America.
I mention the words discretion, prudence and effectiveness to emphasize that the CAL is not called to replace any actor in Latin American ecclesial life. But she is called to encourage them all, with the simplicity and depth of someone who trusts more in missionary sending and service than in mere activism. In this way, the CAL must promote with all its interlocutors, both in the Holy See and in the CELAM, the CEAMA, the CLAR, the Episcopal Conferences and all the ecclesial organizations that directly or indirectly serve the Church in Latin America , a synodal style of thinking, feeling and doing.
In this regard, providentially, the CAL and the Church in Latin America can have a source of deep inspiration in Saint Juan Diego. As we know, he was an extremely modest and simple indigenous person. The Virgin does not choose him because of his erudition, because of his organizational capacity, or because of his relationship with power. On the contrary, Saint Mary of Guadalupe is moved because he knows he is very small: "I am a tail, I am a wing, I need to be led, carried on my back" (Nican Mopohua, 55). The awareness of his inability, accompanied by the discovery of the great love and closeness that the Virgin Mary has for him, allows Saint Juan Diego to go look for the bishop and helps him to speak to him with charity and clarity about what the Lady of heaven told him. asks. The bishop, who also has a ministry to fulfill, requests a sign so he can believe him. San Juan Diego, obey and find the signal sought on the Tepeyac hill.
In these scenes we can see simultaneous synodality and communion with simplicity and depth. The lay faithful announces the good news, trusting fundamentally in the ecclesial and supernatural dimension of his mission, and not so much in his own strength. This is a beautiful experience of synodal conversion! This same trust also allows him to accept, without complications, the responsibility that the bishop has within the community. The result of this synodal and communion exercise are not only the roses that appear in front of everyone, not only is it the miraculous image printed on the saint's tilma, but the beginning of a process of fraternal reconciliation between feuding peoples. A process that was never perfect, but which undoubtedly helped the birth of a new reality in Latin America. In other words, synodality ad intra bears fruits of fraternity ad extra.
This is the inspiring style that CAL must promote throughout the Latin American region and, when required, even beyond it. Inspire, do not impose. Inspire, motivate and provoke freedom so that each ecclesial and social reality discerns its own path, also following the motions of the Spirit, in communion with the universal Church. The CAL must build bridges of reconciliation, of inclusion, of fraternity! Bridges that allow “walking together” to be not a mere rhetorical expression but an authentic pastoral experience!
Finally, I would like to remind you that we are now close to the ordinary Jubilee of the year 2025. In the bull Spes non confundit I have noted: «Through Juan Diego, the Mother of God sent a revolutionary message of hope that she still repeats today to all pilgrims and to the faithful: “Am I not here, who am your mother?” A similar message is engraved in the hearts of so many Marian shrines spread around the world, destinations of numerous pilgrims, who entrust their concerns, their pains and their hopes to the Mother of God. In this Jubilee Year, may shrines be holy places of welcome and privileged spaces to generate hope” (no. 24).
I trust that all members of the CAL will actively participate in inviting the people of God to pilgrimage and announce the message of hope that the entire region is urgent to hear and rediscover.
May Saint Mary of Guadalupe, "Mother of the most true God for Whom we live" (Nican mopohua, 26), sustain us and encourage us to persevere in the joint effort to make the Church a community increasingly in the style of Jesus. And please don't forget to pray for me.