The Catholic Church must follow Jesus' command

VATICAN CITY —The Catholic Church must follow Jesus' command to preach
the Gospel to every person, otherwise it will not fulfill its mission of
bearing witness to Christ, Pope Francis said.

In an excerpt of a new book-length interview published Nov. 4 by Fides,
news agency of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, the
pope said the phrase he uses -- "a church on the move" -- is not meant
to be a "fashionable expression" but a summary of the church's mission.

"The church is either on the move or she is not (the) church. Either she
evangelizes or she is not (the) church. If the church is not on the
move, she decays, she becomes something else," he said.

The book, titled "Without Him, We Can Do Nothing: a Conversation About
Being Missionaries in Today's World," will be released in Italian
bookstores Nov. 5. It was written by Gianni Valente, a journalist for Fides..

Reflecting on evangelization, the pope said that to evangelize means to
deliver Christ's teachings "in simple and precise words like the
apostles did" without the need to "invent persuasive discourses."

"The proclamation of the Gospel can even be whispered, but it always
passes through the overwhelming power of the scandal of the cross. And
it has always followed the path indicated in the letter of the apostle
Peter, which consists in simply 'providing reasons' of one's hope to
others, a hope that remains a scandal and foolishness in the eyes of the
world," he said.

True missionaries, he said, act as "facilitators and not as controllers
of the faith."

Facilitators, he explained, make things easier without "placing
obstacles to Jesus' desire to embrace everyone, to heal everyone, to
save everyone, not being selective, not imposing 'pastoral tariffs,' not
playing the part of the guard at the door controlling who has the right
to enter."

Asked regarding missionaries of the past and debates that arose
regarding "who was worthy to receive baptism," Pope Francis said that,
in the 16th century, Pope Paul III rejected those who theorized that
indigenous people "were by nature 'incapable' of accepting the Gospel."

However, even today, there are "circles and sectors that present
themselves as enlightened and even (seize) the proclamation of the
Gospel through their distorted reasoning that divides the world between
'civilized' and 'barbaric,'" he said.

The pope said that this form of thinking was prevalent among those who
criticized the Synod of Bishops for the Amazon.

"They consider a large part of the human family as if they were a
lower-class entity, unable to achieve decent levels in spiritual and
intellectual life according to their standards. On this basis, contempt
can develop for people considered to be second rate," he said.

Pope Francis said that Christianity "does not embrace only one cultural
model." Citing St. John Paul II, he said that while the church remains
true to itself in proclaiming the Gospel and preserving its traditions,
"Christianity will also reflect the different faces of the cultures and
peoples in which it is received and takes root."

While some cultures are closely linked to the proclamation of the Gospel
and the development of Christian thought, he added, Christians must keep
in the mind that the divine revelation "is not identified with a
particular culture."

"When meeting new cultures, or cultures that have not accepted the
Christian proclamation, we must not try to impose a determined cultural
form," Pope Francis said. "Today, in mission."