Pope Francis on July 29, 2018, sent a message of greetings to the President of the Christian Life Community Executive Council (Christian Life Community – CVX-CLC), Mauricio López Oropeza, and to all the participants in the XVII World Assembly held in Buenos Aires from July 22-31, 2018, on the theme “CLC, a gift for the Church and for the world”, in the 50th anniversary of the foundation of the Association:
Here is the Holy Father’s Message, Provided by the Vatican:
To Mr. Mauricio López Oropeza
President of the World Christian Life Community
Dear brother,
I have received your thoughtful letter letting me know about the forthcoming celebration of your 2018 World Assembly, which coincides with the 50th anniversary of your journeying as Christian Life Community. For this reason, you want to pray and reflect together so that the Lord may grant you a greater depth in the living out of your charism, and thus, by delving deeper into the received charism, you may continue to be a gift for the Church and for the world.
Note, the recognition of the gift and the grace that the Lord has given you over these years shall lead you, firstly, into a humble act of thanksgiving, because Jesus has looked at you beyond your qualities and virtues. At the same time, this entails a call to responsibility, to leave yourselves behind and go forth to encounter others, to nourish them with the only bread capable of satisfying the human heart: the love of Christ. That the “gnostic illusion” may not confuse you.
At the center of your Ignatian spirituality is this desire to be contemplatives in action. Contemplation and action, the two dimensions together: because we can only enter the heart of God through the wounds of Christ, and we know that Christ is wounded in the hungry, the uneducated, the discarded, the old, the sick, the imprisoned, in all the vulnerable human flesh.
To be guided by a Christian way of life, with a strong spiritual life and working for the Kingdom, means letting oneself be shaped by the love of Jesus, having his same sentiments (see Phil 2: 5), asking oneself continuously: What have I done for Christ? What am I doing for Christ? What ought I to do for Christ? (see Sp. Ex. 53).
I thank you for your dedication and love for the Church and our brethren, and I encourage you to continue making Christ present in your surroundings, giving apostolic meaning to all your occupations.
And, please, do not stop praying for me. May Jesus bless you and may the Holy Virgin take care of you.
© Libreria Editrice Vatican
