Pope Francis: Witness to the Passion for Evangelisation

I continue to find interesting Pope Francis' sequence of General Audience addresses on the passion for evangelisation. He is now dedicating them to witnesses to this zeal drawn from the life of the Church.

He has recently spoken about Matteo Ricci, a Jesuit missionary to China in the late 16th/early 17th century. Pope Francis' General Audience address can be found here, and it is possible to note the element of cultural encounter that formed Matteo Ricci's life in China. A more academic, and complementary, account of his missionary activity can be found at Thinking Faith: Matteo Ricci: Shaped by the Chinese.

Most recently, Pope Francis has spoken about St Therese of Lisieux, a patron saint of missionaries. The Audience address is here. Commenting on the well known story of St Therese's prayer for Enrico Pranzini, Pope Francis observed:

Brothers and sisters, such is the power of intercession moved by charity; such is the engine of mission! Missionaries, in fact — of whom Thérèse is patroness — are not only those who travel long distances, learn new languages, do good works, and are good at proclamation; no, a missionary is also anyone who lives as an instrument of God’s love where they are. Missionaries are those who do everything so that, through their witness, their prayer, their intercession, Jesus might pass by.

This is the apostolic zeal that, let us always remember, never works by proselytism — never  — or constraint, — never — but by attraction. Faith is born by attraction. One does not become Christian because they are forced by someone, but because they have been touched by love. More than having many available means, methods, and structures, which sometimes distract from what is essential, the Church needs hearts like Thérèse’s, hearts that draw people to love and bring people closer to God. And let us ask the saint — we have her relics here — let us ask the saint  for the grace to overcome our selfishness and let us ask for the passion to intercede so that this attraction can be greater in people and so that Jesus might be known and loved.