Holy Father Pope Francis urged all the Bishops, priests and deacons, who, by their vocation have the mission of supporting the poor, together with all consecrated persons and all associations to help and make an effort to create moments of encounter and friendship, in the week preceding the World Poor Day. His Holiness has asked the Christian community all over the world to mark 19th November of this year, the Thirty-third Sunday of Ordinary Time, as the First World Day of the Poor.
Reflecting on the words of the Apostle John: ‘Little children, let us not love in word or speech, but in deed and truth’ (1Jn 3:18), Holy Father Pope Francis remarked that “These words of the Apostle John voice an imperative that no Christian may disregard and the seriousness with which the beloved disciple hands down Jesus’ command to our own day is made even clearer by the contrast between the empty words so frequently on our lips and the concrete deeds against which we are called to measure ourselves.” Further, His Holiness added, “Love has no alibi and whenever we set out to love as Jesus loved, we have to take the Lord as our example; especially when it comes to the poor.”
His Holiness clearly conveyed the significance of loving the poor and reminded that for Christ’s disciples, poverty is above all a call to follow Jesus in his own poverty and urged all the faithful to invite the poor and volunteers to take part together in the Eucharist on 19th November, 2017, in such a way that there be an even more authentic celebration of the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Universal King, on the following Sundays.
