"Religious, ethnic and cultural diversity is a resource, not an obstacle."Silvio Ferrari: "Respect for diversity must start with religions".This first month of 2024, Pope Francis asks Catholics not to be afraid "of the diversity of charisms in the Church". The Holy Father encourages in his January video to "rejoice in living this diversity," which has been present since "the first Christian communities."
Francis affirms that "to advance along the path of faith we also need ecumenical dialogue" with other religious confessions and different Christian denominations. The Pontiff emphasizes that these conversations cannot be seen as "something that confuses or bothers, but as a gift that God gives to the Christian community so that it may grow as one body, the Body of Christ".
To live this gift, we must allow ourselves to be guided by the Holy Spirit, the Pope explains. Thanks to him, we remember "that above all we are God's beloved children. We are all equal in God's love and all different.
For this reason, Francis commends Catholics to pray that the Holy Spirit "will help us to recognize the gift of different charisms within Christian communities and to describe the richness of the different ritual traditions within the Catholic Church."
This intention The Holy Father's message comes just in the month in which the Octave for Christian Unity is celebrated. Precisely the motto for the octave of this year 2024 is "You shall love the Lord your God... And your neighbor as yourself" (Luke 10:27).
The full video with the Pope's prayer intention can be seen below:
