Anglican Mainstream

The Pope said this today as he dedicated his weekly general audience to the theme of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, which begins today.

 

The annual celebration is held in the Northern hemisphere in the week leading up to the feast of the conversion of St. Paul (Jan. 25), while in the Southern hemisphere, it is generally marked around the feast of Pentecost.

"The full and visible unity of Christians for which we long demands that we allow ourselves to be ever more perfectly transformed and conformed to the image of Christ," the Holy Father stated. "The unity for which we pray requires interior conversion, both communal and personal. It is not simply a matter of kindness and cooperation; above all, we must strengthen our faith in God, in the God of Jesus Christ, who has spoken to us and who made himself one of us; we must enter into new life in Christ, which is our true and definitive victory; we must open ourselves to one another, cultivating all the elements of that unity that God has preserved for us and gives to us ever anew; we must feel the urgency of bearing witness before the men of our times to the living God, who made himself known in Christ.'