Jesus sends us to evangelize, to proclaim his name with joy: Pope

Vatican City, 27 April 2013: ‘Jesus sends us to evangelize, to proclaim his name with joy’. That was the focus of Pope Francis’s homily, during the Mass at the chapel of St. Martha’s residence in the Vatican on Saturday morning.
While inviting the people to proclaim Jesus with joy, he also exhorted them not to be ‘closed in on themselves’. Among those attended the Mass were the employees of the Vatican Post Office and the St. Martha Pediatric Dispensary.

Reflecting on a reading from the Acts of the Apostles, the Pontiff asked: why did many people close themselves off to hearing the word of the Lord in Antioch, where the community of Christ’s disciples had gathered?
The reason is, Pope Francis explained, "Simply, because they had closed hearts, they were not open to the newness of the Holy Spirit. They believed that everything had been said, that everything was as they thought it should be and therefore they felt like defenders of the faith and began to speak against the Apostles….’

The Pope went on to say that ‘this is exactly the attitude of groups with closed religiosity that does not have the freedom to open up to the Lord." Communities such as these think they are defending the truth, Pope Francis explained, but what they are really doing is spreading gossip and slander, They look inwards and end up destroying each other.

But it is the Lord’s community that goes forward, these communities are open to the Holy Spirit, they spread the Word of God. This, Pope Francis added, is a criteria for the Church, our own consciences, our parish communities and our religious communities.

The Pope concluded saying, look at how Jesus sends us to evangelize, he wants us to proclaim his name with joy. And Pope Francis underlined that we should not be "afraid of the joy of the Spirit," and not be "closed in on ourselves."

Source: VR Sedoc