VATICAN INFORMATION SERVICE
YEAR XXII - # 153
DATE 10-09-2015

Summary:
- Audience with the prime minister of Kuwait: the importance of education in
promoting respect and peaceful coexistence of peoples and religions
- To new bishops: no sphere of human existence is excluded from the pastor's
interest
- The Pope receives the Equipes Notre Dame: Christian couples are in a better
condition to announce Jesus Christ to other families
- The Holy Father to visit Kenya, Uganda and the Central African Republic in
November
- Audiences

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 Audience with the prime minister of Kuwait: the importance of education in
promoting respect and peaceful coexistence of peoples and religions
 Vatican City, 10 September 2015 (VIS) - Today the Holy Father Francis received
in audience His Highness Sheik Jaber Mubarak Al-Hamad Al-Sabah, prime minister
of the State of Kuwait, who subsequently met with Cardinal Secretary of State
Pietro Parolin, accompanied by Archbishop Paul R. Gallagher, secretary for
Relations with States.
 During the cordial discussions, various themes of mutual interest were
reviewed, including the positive contribution that the historical Christian
minority offers to Kuwaiti society. The Parties also focused on the importance
of education in promoting a culture of respect and peaceful coexistence between
the different peoples and religions.
 A Memorandum of Understanding between the Secretariat of State and the
Ministry
of Foreign Affairs of the State of Kuwait was then signed by Archbishop Paul R.
Gallagher and Sheik Sabah Khalid Al-Hamad Al-Sabah, first deputy prime minister
and minister for foreign affairs. With this instrument the Parties undertake to
consolidate and strengthen bilateral relations in order to favour mutual
collaboration, peace and regional and international stability.
 The agreement further strengthens the bonds of collaboration in the political
and cultural spheres, and offers tools for consultation between the Parties. It
entered into effect immediately upon signing.

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 To new bishops: no sphere of human existence is excluded from the pastor's
interest
 Vatican City, 10 September 2015 (VIS) - The bishops are witnesses to the risen
Christ, educators, spiritual guides and catechists, mystagogues and
missionaries, Pope Francis affirmed this morning as he received in audience in
the Clementine Hall the new bishops ordained during the past year. They were
accompanied by Cardinal Marc Ouellet, P.S.S., prefect of the Congregation for
Bishops, and Cardinal Leonardo Sandri, prefect of the Congregation for the
Oriental Churches. The following are extensive extracts from the Holy Father's
address.
 "Bishops .. are witnesses of the Resurrected Christ. This is your primary and
indispensable task. You have been entrusted the preaching of the reality that
holds up the entire edifice of the Church. Jesus is risen! ... We too will be
resurrected with Christ. ... This is not an obvious or easy proclamation. The
world is so content with ... what it is seemingly able to provide that appears
useful to suppress the demand for what is definitive. ... However, we are
assailed
by questions, the answers to which can only come from a definitive future. ...
How
can we face our difficult present if our sense of belonging to the community of
the Risen Christ fades? Will we be able to remember the greatness of human
destiny if there abates in us the courage to subordinate our life to the love
that does not die?".
 "I think of great challenges such as globalisation, which brings together
those
who are distant from each other yet at the same time separates those who are
close; I think of the epochal phenomenon of migration that unsettles our times;
I think of the natural environment, the garden God gave to us as the habitat
for
human beings and for other creatures, threatened by short-sighted and often
predatory exploitation; I think of the dignity and future of human work, of
which entire generations are deprived; I think of the desertification of
relationships, a widespread abdication of responsibility ... the bewilderment
of
many young people and the solitude of many elderly. ... I do not wish to focus
on
this agenda of tasks to complete as I do not want to alarm you. ... I wish
only to
offer to you the joy of the Gospel. ... Remember always that it is the Gospel
that
protects you and therefore do not be afraid to go everywhere and to be with
those whom God has entrusted to you. ... No sphere of human life is excluded
from
the interest of the heart of the pastor. ... Be on your guard against the
danger
of neglecting the many and singular situations of the members of your flock; do
not renounce encounters with them; do not spare preaching of the living Word of
the Lord; invite all to the mission".
 Bishops as educators, spiritual guides and catechists
 "With those who are at home, who frequent your communities and partake of the
Eucharist, I invite you to be educators, spiritual guides and catechists, able
to take them by the hand and to lead them up Mount Tabor, guiding them in the
knowledge of the mystery they profess. ... Do not spare any efforts in
accompanying them and do not let them resign themselves to staying on the
plain".
 Bishops as mystagogues
 "I think of baptised people who do not however respond to the demands of their
Baptism. Perhaps it has long been thought that the land on which the seed of
the
Gospel falls is not in need of care. Some have drifted away as they are
disillusioned by the promises of faith or perhaps because the path to realising
them has appeared too challenging. Some instead leave, slamming the door behind
them, holding our weaknesses against us or seeking, while not entirely
successfully, to convince themselves that they had been deceived by hopes that
were ultimately dashed. Be bishops able to intercept their path. ... Do not be
scandalised by their pain or their disappointments. Enlighten them with a
humble
flame ... always able to illuminate those who are reached by its light that is,
however, never blinding. Devote time to meeting them on the road to their
Emmaus. Offer them words that show to them what they are still unable to see:
the hidden potential of their very delusions. ... More than with words, warm
their
hearts by humbly listening, interested in what is truly good for them, so that
they open their eyes and are able to reverse course, returning to Him, from
Whom
they had drifted.
 Bishops as missionaries
 "As pastors and missionaries of God's gratuitous salvation, seek also those
who
do not know Jesus or have simply refused Him. Go in their direction ... without
fear or unease. ... It is not true that we can do without these distant
brothers.
It is not permissible for us to dispense with our concerns about their fate.
...
Seeing in us the Lord Who calls to them, perhaps they will have the courage to
respond to the divine invitation. If so, our communities will be enriched by
what they have to share and our Pastors' hearts will rejoice to repeat once
more, "Today salvation has come to this house".

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 The Pope receives the Equipes Notre Dame: Christian couples are in a better
condition to announce Jesus Christ to other families
 Vatican City, 10 September 2015 (VIS) - This morning in the Paul VI Hall the
Pope received in audience the participants in the International Meeting of the
Equipes Notre Dame (Teams of Our Lady, END), held in Rome on the theme, "Here I
am Lord, send me". The Equipes are a lay movement focusing on married
spirituality, established in response to the needs of couples to live fully the
sacrament of marriage, using its own method and exploring the complex reality
of
married couples today. The END were founded in France in 1938 upon the
initiative of a number of couples and the priest Fr. Henri Caffarel, whose
cause
for beatification has been received in Rome.
 Recalling the upcoming Synod on the family, Francis invited the members of the
END to pray for the Synod Fathers and for what they must reflect upon in the
assembly on the "vital cell of our societies ... in the difficult current
cultural
context", and devoted his discourse primarily to the missionary role of the
Equipes Notre Dame.
 "Christian couples and families are often in the best position to announce
Jesus Christ to other families, to support them, to strengthen and encourage
them. What you live in the couple and the family - accompanied by the charism
typical of your movement - this profound and unique joy that the Lord enables
you to experience in the intimacy of domestic life, between joy and suffering,
you must bear witness to ... so that others, in turn, take the same path".
 The Pope encouraged all the couples to live deeply the "concrete aspects of
commitment" of the movement, such as prayer in couples and in the family, a
"beautiful and necessary tradition that has always supported the faith and hope
of Christians, and unfortunately abandoned in many regions of the world". He
also emphasised the importance of monthly dialogue between spouses, "that
well-known and challenging 'need to sit down' that is counter to the habits of
our frenetic and agitated world riven with individualism". Finally,
participation in the life of a team brings "the wealth of teaching and sharing,
as well as the help and comfort of friendship". In this respect Francis
underlined the mutual fruitfulness of meeting with the accompanying priests,
and
thanked the couples of the END for the support and encouragement in the
ministry
of their priests "who always find, in contact with your Equipes and your
families, priestly joy, fraternal presence, emotional balance and spiritual
paternity".
 The missionary task of the movement is of supreme importance and the Holy
Father indicated various fields of action, such as accompanying young couples
and forming them in faith before and after marriage, or closeness to wounded
families, "of whom there are so many these days, due to unemployment, ...
health
problems, bereavement ... the imbalance caused by distance or absence, or a
climate of violence. We must have the courage to enter into contact with these
families, in a discreet but generous way, materially, humanly and spiritually,
in those circumstances in which they are vulnerable".
 Finally, the Pope encouraged couples to "be instruments of the mercy of Christ
and the Church towards those whose marriage has failed. Never forget that your
conjugal fidelity is a gift from God, and that mercy has been shown to every
one
of us. A united and happy couple can understand better than any other, from
within, the harm and the suffering caused by abandonment, betrayal, and a lack
of love. It is necessary, therefore, that you bring your witness and your
experience to help Christian communities to discern the real situations in
which
these people find themselves, to welcome them with their wounds, and to help
them to journey in faith and in truth, under the gaze of Christ the Good
Shepherd, to take part in the life of the Church in an appropriate way. Nor
must
you forget the unspeakable suffering of the children who experience these
painful family situations.

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 The Holy Father to visit Kenya, Uganda and the Central African Republic in
November
 Vatican City, 10 September 2015 (VIS) - Accepting the invitation issued by the
respective Heads of State and the bishops, Pope Francis will make an apostolic
trip to Kenya from 25 to 27 November 2015, Uganda from 27 to 29 November, and
the Central African Republic from 29 to 30 November. The programme of the trip
will be published in due course.

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 Audiences
 Vatican City, 10 September 2015 (VIS) - Today, the Holy Father received in
audience Archbishop Luigi Bonazzi, apostolic nuncio in Canada.

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