CNS STORY: Pope: Catholics must bring Gospel to world debased by poverty, abuses

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CNS Story:

POPE-MISSION May-29-2007 (350 words) xxxi

Pope: Catholics must bring Gospel to world debased by poverty, abuses

By Carol Glatz
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The primary task of every Catholic is to bring the Gospel message to a world debased by poverty, violence and human rights abuses, Pope Benedict XVI said.

Through its missionary action, the pope said, the church can "guide and evangelize cultural, social and ethical transformations and offer Christ's salvation to modern humankind, debased and oppressed in so many parts of the world because of endemic poverty, violence and the systematic denial of human rights."

While renewed efforts for evangelization have proven fruitful, there is "still more to be done to answer the missionary call the Lord tirelessly makes to every baptized person," he said in his message for World Mission Sunday 2007.

The Vatican released this year's message May 29, ahead of World Mission Sunday, to be celebrated Oct. 21 in most dioceses.

Addressing this year's theme, "All the Churches for All the World," the pope focused on the need for every local church to breathe new life into its missionary mandate.

Bringing Christ's saving power to all people "truly involves everyone," he said.

Individual Catholics must see themselves not as simple "collaborators" in the church's evangelizing mission, but as being "protagonists" and jointly responsible for carrying it out, the pope said.

He said every local diocese on every continent needs to be aware of the "urgent need to relaunch missionary activity to meet the many serious challenges of our time."

Pope Benedict said increased secularization has had an impact on the established churches in the West.

Low birthrates, declining numbers of vocations and an increasingly older clergy put the established churches at "risk of closing in on themselves, of looking to the future with less hope and of lessening their missionary efforts," he said.

But the pope said God never abandons his people, who must recognize that this is the moment "to open with confidence to God's providence" and trust that through the Holy Spirit, God will guide them toward the fulfillment of his eternal plan, the salvation of humanity.

END

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