Message
of the Synod Assembly on the pastoral challenges to the family in the context
of evangelisation
Vatican
City, 18 October 2014 (VIS) – This morning a press conference was held in the
Holy See Press Office to present the Message of the Third Extraordinary
Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, dedicated to the “Pastoral challenges to the
family in the context of evangelisation” (5-19 October). The speakers were
Cardinals Raymundo Damasceno Assis, archbishop of Aparecida, Brazil, delegate
president; Gianfranco Ravasi, president of the Pontifical Council for Culture
and president of the Commission for the Message and Oswald Gracias, archbishop
of Bombay, India. The full text of the message is published below:
“We,
Synod Fathers, gathered in Rome together with Pope Francis in the Extraordinary
General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, greet all families of the different
continents and in particular all who follow Christ, the Way, the Truth, and the
Life. We admire and are grateful for the daily witness which you offer us and
the world with your fidelity, faith, hope, and love.
Each of us, pastors of the Church, grew up
in a family, and we come from a great variety of backgrounds and experiences.
As priests and bishops we have lived alongside families who have spoken to us
and shown us the saga of their joys and their difficulties.
The preparation for this synod assembly,
beginning with the questionnaire sent to the Churches around the world, has
given us the opportunity to listen to the experience of many families. Our
dialogue during the Synod has been mutually enriching, helping us to look at
the complex situations which face families today.
We offer you the words of Christ: “Behold,
I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I
will enter his house and dine with him, and he with me”. On his journeys along
the roads of the Holy Land, Jesus would enter village houses. He continues to
pass even today along the streets of our cities. In your homes there are light
and shadow. Challenges often present themselves and at times even great trials.
The darkness can grow deep to the point of becoming a dense shadow when evil
and sin work into the heart of the family.
We recognise the great challenge to remain
faithful in conjugal love. Enfeebled faith and indifference to true values,
individualism, impoverishment of relationships, and stress that excludes
reflection leave their mark on family life. There are often crises in marriage,
often confronted in haste and without the courage to have patience and reflect,
to make sacrifices and to forgive one another. Failures give rise to new
relationships, new couples, new civil unions, and new marriages, creating
family situations which are complex and problematic, where the Christian choice
is not obvious.
We think also of the burden imposed by
life in the suffering that can arise with a child with special needs, with grave
illness, in deterioration of old age, or in the death of a loved one. We admire
the fidelity of so many families who endure these trials with courage, faith,
and love. They see them not as a burden inflicted on them, but as something in
which they themselves give, seeing the suffering Christ in the weakness of the
flesh.
We recall the difficulties caused by
economic systems, by the “the idolatry of money and the dictatorship of an
impersonal economy lacking a truly human purpose” which weakens the dignity of
people. We remember unemployed parents who are powerless to provide basic needs
for their families, and youth who see before them days of empty expectation,
who are prey to drugs and crime.
We think of so many poor families, of
those who cling to boats in order to reach a shore of survival, of refugees
wandering without hope in the desert, of those persecuted because of their
faith and the human and spiritual values which they hold. These are stricken by
the brutality of war and oppression. We remember the women who suffer violence
and exploitation, victims of human trafficking, children abused by those who
ought to have protected them and fostered their development, and the members of
so many families who have been degraded and burdened with difficulties. “The
culture of prosperity deadens us…. all those lives stunted for lack of
opportunity seem a mere spectacle; they fail to move us”. We call on
governments and international organizations to promote the rights of the family
for the common good.
Christ wanted his Church to be a house
with doors always open to welcome everyone. We warmly thank our pastors, lay
faithful, and communities who accompany couples and families and care for their
wounds.
***
There is also the evening light behind the
windowpanes in the houses of the cities, in modest residences of suburbs and
villages, and even in mere shacks, which shines out brightly, warming bodies
and souls. This light—the light of a wedding story—shines from the encounter
between spouses: it is a gift, a grace expressed, as the Book of Genesis says,
when the two are “face to face” as equal and mutual helpers. The love of man
and woman teaches us that each needs the other in order to be truly self. Each
remains different from the other that opens self and is revealed in the
reciprocal gift. It is this that the bride of the Song of Songs sings in her
canticle: “My beloved is mine and I am his… I am my beloved’s and my beloved is
mine”.
This authentic encounter begins with
courtship, a time of waiting and preparation. It is realized in the sacrament
where God sets his seal, his presence, and grace. This path also includes
sexual relationship, tenderness, intimacy, and beauty capable of lasting longer
than the vigour and freshness of youth. Such love, of its nature, strives to be
forever to the point of laying down one’s life for the beloved. In this light
conjugal love, which is unique and indissoluble, endures despite many
difficulties. It is one of the most beautiful of all miracles and the most
common.
This love spreads through fertility and
generativity, which involves not only the procreation of children but also the
gift of divine life in baptism, their catechesis, and their education. It
includes the capacity to offer life, affection, and values—an experience
possible even for those who have not been able to bear children. Families who
live this light-filled adventure become a sign for all, especially for young
people.
This journey is sometimes a mountainous
trek with hardships and falls. God is always there to accompany us. The family
experiences his presence in affection and dialogue between husband and wife,
parents and children, sisters and brothers. They embrace him in family prayer
and listening to the Word of God—a small, daily oasis of the spirit. They
discover him every day as they educate their children in the faith and in the
beauty of a life lived according to the Gospel, a life of holiness.
Grandparents also share in this task with great affection and dedication. The
family is thus an authentic domestic Church that expands to become the family
of families which is the ecclesial community. Christian spouses are called to
become teachers of faith and of love for young couples as well.
Another expression of fraternal communion
is charity, giving, nearness to those who are last, marginalized, poor, lonely,
sick, strangers, and families in crisis, aware of the Lord’s word, “It is more
blessed to give than to receive”. It is a gift of goods, of fellowship, of love
and mercy, and also a witness to the truth, to light, and to the meaning of
life.
The high point which sums up all the
threads of communion with God and neighbor is the Sunday Eucharist when the
family and the whole Church sits at table with the Lord. He gives himself to
all of us, pilgrims through history towards the goal of the final encounter
when “Christ is all and in all”. In the first stage of our Synod itinerary,
therefore, we have reflected on how to accompany those who have been divorced
and remarried and on their participation in the sacraments.
We Synod Fathers ask you walk with us
towards the next Synod. The presence of the family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph
in their modest home hovers over you. United to the Family of Nazareth, we raise
to the Father of all our petition for the families of the world:
Father, grant to all families the presence
of strong and wise spouses who may be the source of a free and united family.
Father, grant that parents may have a home
in which to live in peace with their families.
Father, grant that children may be a sign
of trust and hope and that young people may have the courage to forge
life-long, faithful commitments.
Father, grant to all that they may be able
to earn bread with their hands, that they may enjoy serenity of spirit and that
they may keep aflame the torch of faith even in periods of darkness.
Father, grant that we may all see flourish
a Church that is ever more faithful and credible, a just and humane city, a
world that loves truth, justice and mercy”.
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