VATICAN, AICA and editorial team •
Francis calls us to be close to those Christians who have distanced themselves from their faith in Christ and highlighted the importance of joy in proclaiming the message of the Gospels, in the July 2017 edition of The Pope Video, promoted by the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network. “But we must not leave him alone. We should offer him Christian hope – with our words, yes, but more with our testimony, with our freedom, with our joy,” he said.
“Let us pray for our brothers and sisters who have strayed from the faith that, through our prayer and witness to the Gospel, may rediscover the beauty of the Christian life,” the Pope urged.
“We must not leave him alone. We should offer him Christian hope – with our words, yes, but more with our testimony, with our freedom, with your joy,” he added.
The Holy Father emphasised the importance of transmitting joy as a way of accompanying people who, irrespective of their circumstances, have distanced themselves from the message of the Gospel and the teachings of Christ.
Emphasising his intention, Francis stated that sadness in a Christian is a clear sign that they have distanced themselves from Jesus.
With more than 2.200 million Christians around the world, Francis proposed going even further than the concrete reality of the Catholic Church, once again drawing attention to accompanying those who might be experiencing a crisis of faith. Among his petitions, the Pope also called on Christians to offer a path of hope through personal witness and the practice of freedom.
The Holy Father’s prayers are entrusted each month to the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network and The Pope Video is produced by La Machi Communication for Good Causes with the support of the Society of Jesus, IndigoMusic and GettyImagesLatam, and the collaboration of Centro Televisivo Vaticano (CTV). From the start, schoenstatt.org has published these videos on its page.
Since its launch in January 2016, the videos have been viewed more than 14 million times on their dedicated websites.
Where can I see the video?
Official The Pope Video website
The Pope Video YouTube channel
The Pope Video Facebook page
schoenstatt.org (bottom of the page)
Original: Spanish, 9 July. Translation: Sarah-Leah Pimentel, Cape Town South Africa.
