From Vatican Radio:
Pope Francis on Saturday addressed the participants in the
Plenary Assembly of the Pontifical Council for Social Communications.
Pope Francis said the goal of the Church for its
communications efforts is “to understand how to enter into dialogue with the
men and women of today in order to appreciate their desires, their doubts and
their hopes.”
The Holy Father said we must examine if the communications
of the Church are helping others to meet Christ.
“The challenge is to rediscover, through the means of social
communication as well as by personal contact, the beauty that is at the heart
of our existence and our journey, the beauty of faith and of the encounter with
Christ,” he said.
Below is the full text of Pope Francis' remarks
Dear Brothers and Sisters, good morning!
I greet you and I thank you for your work and commitment to
the important sector of social communications – but having spoken to Archbishop
Celli, I must change “sector” to the important “dimension of life” which is
that of social communications. I wish to thank Archbishop Claudio Maria Celli
for the greeting that he extended to me on your behalf. I would like to share
some thoughts with you.
First of all: the importance of social communications for
the Church. This year is the fiftieth anniversary of the Conciliar Decree Inter
Mirifica. This anniversary is more than a commemoration; the Decree expresses
the Church’s attentiveness towards communication and all its instruments, which
are also important in the work of evangelisation. But towards its instruments –
communication is not an instrument! It’s something else. In the last few
decades, the various means of communication have evolved significantly, but the
Church’s concern remains the same, taking on new forms and expressions. The
world of social communications, more and more, has become a “living
environment” for many, a web where people communicate with each other,
expanding the boundaries of their knowledge and relationships (cf. Benedict
XVI, Message for the 2013 World Communications Day). I wish to underline these
positive aspects, although we are all aware of the limitations and harmful
factors which also exist.
In this context – and this is the second reflection – we
must ask ourselves: what role should the Church have in terms of its own
practical means of communication? In every situation, beyond technological
considerations, I believe that the goal is to understand how to enter into
dialogue with the men and women of today, in order to appreciate their desires,
their doubts, and their hopes. They are men and women who sometimes feel let
down by a Christianity that to them appears sterile, struggling precisely to
communicate the depth of meaning that faith gives. We do in fact witness today,
in the age of globalisation, a growing sense of disorientation and isolation;
we see, increasingly, a loss of meaning to life, an inability to connect with a
“home”, and a struggle to build meaningful relationships. It is therefore
important to know how to dialogue, and how to enter, with discernment, into the
environments created by new technologies, into social networks, in such a way
as to reveal a presence that listens, converses, and encourages. Do not be
afraid to be this presence, expressing your Christian identity as you become
citizens of this environment. A Church that follows this path learns how to
walk with everybody! And there’s also an ancient rule of the pilgrims, that
Saint Ignatius includes, and that’s why I know it! In one of his rules, he says
that anyone accompanying a pilgrim must walk at the same pace as the pilgrim,
not ahead and not lagging behind. And this is what I mean: a Church that
accompanies the journey, that knows how to walk as people walk today. This rule
of the pilgrim will help us to inspire things.
The third: it’s a challenge that we all face together in
this environment of social communications, and the problem is not principally
technological. We must ask ourselves: are we capable of bringing Christ into
this area, or rather, of bringing about the encounter with Christ? To walk with
the pilgrim through life, but as Jesus walked with the pilgrims of Emmaus,
warming their hearts and leading them to the Lord? Are we capable of
communicating the face of a Church which can be a “home” to everyone? We talk
about the Church behind closed doors. But this is more than a Church with open
doors, it’s more! Finding “home” together, building “home”, building the
Church. It’s this: building the Church as we walk. A challenge! To lead to the
rediscovery, through means of social communication as well as by personal
contact, of the beauty which is at the heart of our existence and our journey,
the beauty of faith, the beauty of the encounter with Christ. Even in the
context of social communications, the Church is required to bring warmth, to
warm hearts. Do our presence and plans measure up to this requirement, or do we
remain mired in technicalities? We hold a precious treasure that is to be
passed on, a treasure that brings light and hope. They are greatly needed. All
this, however, requires a careful and thorough formation in this area for
priests, for religious men and women, for laity. The great digital continent
does not only involve technology, but is made up of real men and women who
bring with them what they carry inside, their hopes, their suffering, their
concerns, their pursuit of truth, beauty, and good. We need to show and bring
Christ to others, sharing these joys and hopes, like Mary, who brought Christ
to the hearts of men and women; we need to pass through the clouds of
indifference without losing our way; we need to descend into the darkest night
without being overcome and disorientated; we need to listen to the illusions of
many, without being seduced; we need to share their disappointments, without
becoming despondent; to sympathise with those whose lives are falling apart,
without losing our own strength and identity (cf. Pope Francis, Address to the
Bishops of Brazil, 27 July 2013, n. 4). This is the walk. This is the
challenge.
Dear friends, the concern and the presence of the Church in
the world of social communications is important in order to dialogue with the
men and women of today and bring them to meet Christ, but the encounter with
Christ is personal. It cannot be manipulated. In these times we see a great
temptation within the Church, which is spiritual harassment: the manipulation
of conscience; a theological brainwashing which in the end leads to an
encounter with Christ which is purely nominal, not with the Live Person of
Christ. In a person’s encounter with Christ, both Christ and the person need to
be involved! Not what’s wanted by the “spiritual engineer”, who wants to
manipulate people. This is the challenge. To bring about the encounter with Christ
in the full knowledge, though, that we ourselves are means of communication,
and that the fundamental problem is not the acquisition of the latest
technologies, although these are necessary to a valid, contemporary presence.
It is necessary to be absolutely clear that the God in whom we believe, who
loves all men and women intensely, wants to reveal himself through the means at
our disposal, however poor they are, because it is he who is at work, he who
transforms, and he who saves us.
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