Pope Francis sent a message to attendees of the 4th Meeting of the Catholic Church in the Legal Amazon, held June 6-9 in Santarém (PA), urging the bishops and priests in the region to be “bold and daring”.
“Let’s imagine together the Christian communities that can join and incarnate in the Amazon, to the point of giving the Church new faces with Amazonian characteristics,” the letter written by the Pope says.
“Be brave and daring, open yourself confidently to the action of God, who created all things and inspires us to proclaim the Gospel and contemplate the beauty of creation, which is even more exuberant in the land of the Amazon,” Francis added.
The meeting commemorates the 50th anniversary of the Santarém Document, which outlines acts of evangelization in the Amazon. The forest was already the subject of a synod convened by Francis in 2019, which led to the apostolic “Querida Amazonia” counsel.
In this document, the Pope proposes expanding the responsibilities of deacons, nuns, and commoners to combat the chronic shortage of priests in the Amazon Rainforest, and argues that the Church fulfills its social role and stands by the oppressed.
source: Noticias
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