Pope Francis' Effort to Revitalize Catholic Mission

International Review of Mission - Wiley Article Share link , 2022

Since his election in 2013, Pope Francis has embarked upon a significant program of teaching, exhortation, and internal church critique aimed at stimulating the missionary reform of the Catholic Church. This article provides an overview of his contributions in this area with attention to his efforts to promote the greater involvement of all the baptized in mission, a deeper spirituality of mission across the church, and renewed practices of proclamation and social outreach. The fundamentally practice-oriented nature of Francis’ teaching is highlighted and a framework for conceiving the central facets of his mission theology is proposed. Article Share link: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/share/author/UXAPCHGE764Z5CYTGK3G?target=10.1111/irom.12434

Claritas: Journal of Dialogue and Culture, Vol. 6, No. 2 (October 2017) 36–42 © 2017.

Abstract: The author begins with a personal testimony of his thirteen-year relationship with Cardinal Bergoglio in Argentina prior to his becoming Pope Francis. He presents the cardinal’s growing relationship with the evangelical community as well as the joint projects they carried out in their city. The author then speaks about his discernment of the signs of the times that Evangelicals can see in Pope Francis: the power of love, a Christian witness of life, the value of Christian poverty, and a leadership of service. He concludes with what he feels called to by the example of Pope Francis: preaching with passion, living the word of God, loving more radically, and returning to the simplicity of the Gospel life.

International Faculty of Theological Studies Buenos Aires

Acta Universitatit Carolinae Theologica, 2019

In his apostolic exhortation Evangelii gaudium published in 2013, Pope Francis encourages all Christian communities toward missionary transformation. The transformation should lead to a genuine awareness and restoration of the missionary nature of the contemporary Church. The papal document has been quoted and commented on a number of times since its publication, as it bears enormous potential for transformation of the Catholic Church and for the mission of all Christians. The article presents an analysis of the four principles proposed by Evangelii gaudium in a section that focuses on the common good and social peace of humankind. The article acknowledges these principles as the axes of hypothesis that deals with reform of the Catholic Church as much as they contain important implications for a Christian theology of Revelation, for a theology of the act of faith and for a basic reflection on the structure of ecclesiastical communities. These elements are accepted as both an intrinsic condition and practical contribution for the Church's missionary transformation.

Theological Studies, 2013

The author argues that a closer and fresh reading of the Vatican II documents with an eye to the theme of mission might suggest that it is closer to the heart of the council's original intention than a cursory and dated reading might indicate. Indeed the church's mission is more urgent today than ever, given the shift of Christianity's center of gravity to the Global South, massive migration to the Global North, and widespread secularism. Revisiting the council's documents can offer substantial help for developing a theology and practice for today's missionary church.

Pope Francis has stated multiple times what he envisions and hopes the church to be and to be for. I simply want to mention a few of these statements. In his preconclave address to his brother cardinals, Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio said: The only purpose of the Church is to go out to tell the world the good news about Jesus Christ. It needs to "surge forth to the peripheries," not juts geographically but to "the existential peripheries" where people grapple with "sin, pain, injustice, ignorance, indifference to religion and misery." Instead the Church has got too wrapped up in itself. It is too navel-gazing. It has become "self-referential" which has made it sick. It is suffering a "kind of theological narcissism." When Jesus said: "Behold I stand at the door and knock" people assumed he was outside, wanting to 1 come in. But sometimes Jesus knocks from within, asking us to let him out into the wider world. "A self-referential Church wants to keep Jesus to itself, instead of letting him" out to others. The Church is supposed to be the "mysterium lunae"-the mystery of the moon is that it has no light but simply reflects the light of the sun, and the mystery of the Church is that it reflects the light of Christ. The Church must not fool itself that it has light of its own; if it does that it gives in to "spiritual worldliness" which is what Henri de Lubac in The Splendour of the Church called "the worst evil that can befall the Church." That is what happens with a selfreferential Church, it believes it has its own light. Put simply, there are two images of the Church: a Church which evangelizes and come out of herself or a worldly Church, living within herself, of herself, for herself. The next pope should be someone who helps the Church surge forth to the peripheries, like a sweet and comforting mother who offers the joy of Jesus to the world, bringing "changes and reforms" for the salvation of souls. The speech lasted just three and a half minutes, instead of the allotted five minutes, Paul Vallely (2015: 152) points out. But it electrified the Synod hall. "Bergoglio was the first man not to be introspective about the problems of the Church but to be outgoing," said Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, "he was more spiritual and theological." Cardinal Christoph Schonborn turned to a neighbor and said: "That's what we need." In his homily for the Mass of Chrism on his first Holy Thursday on the morning of March 28, 2013, traditionally celebrated with the clergy of the diocese, Pope Francis (2013a) spoke: We need to "go out," then, in order to experience our own anointing, its power and redemptive efficacy to the "outskirts" where there is suffering, bloodshed, blindness that longs for sight, and

Asian Horizons, Vol. 14, No. 1, March 2020 Pages: 119-136, 2020

Pope Francis believes that the Church of the third millennium must be Synodal, an ‘inverted pyramid.’ This prophetic and courageous step in Church reform by Pope Francis is in close continuity with the ancient and rich synodal tradition of the Early Church and the unfinished agenda of the Second Vatican Council. In a hierarchical Church the Pope and Bishops are privileged listeners to the Holy Spirit and are mandated to teach the people of God, whereas in the sSynodal church the magisterium listens to the Holy Spirit speaking to them through the people of God (LG 12) as well and, thus, includes a two-way process of common listening to the Spirit and communal discernment (sensus fidei) by the entire people of God who journey together to evangelize and bring about the Kingdom of God. It is a revolutionary move towards de-centralisation of the Catholic church which opens up fresh questions about the role of pope and papal primacy, the juridical status of the local and regional bishops’ conferences and the participation of the laity, especially women, in doctrinal formulation and ecclesiastical administration. In this article, I seek to outline and explain Pope Francis’ vision of a synodal church on the basis his own teachings. Keywords: Catholic Church; Church Governance; Collegiality; Communion; Ecclesiology; Hierarchy; Listening Church; Papal Primacy; Pope Francis, Sensus Fidei; Synodal Church; Synodality

Many of us have become increasingly aware of a growing hostility expressed towards Pope Francis by a number of individuals and fundamentalist Catholic groups who remain ideologically opposed to the reforms carried out after Vatican II during the 1960s. This is perplexing, especially in view of the fact that Pope Francis has shown himself to be a man who is deeply aware both of human reality with all its strengths and weaknesses, and of the tenebrous future that confronts our planet and her peoples. This essay offers a reflection on the man himself and on the influences that have contributed both to his formation and to the particularly unique style of his pontificate.