Verbum Domini part 3 section 1

VERBUM MUNDO
The Word from the Father and to the Father (90 onwards)

• We cannot keep to ourselves the word of eternal life given to us in our encounter with Jesus Christ: they are meant for every one... Everyone today, whether he or she knows it or not, needs this message. It is our responsibility to pass on what, by God's grace, we ourselves have received (apostolate)

• The First Christians saw their missionary preaching as a necessity rooted in the very nature of faith

• Many of our brothers and sisters are baptized but insufficiently evangezed.

• The need for a new evangelization must be valiantly reaffirmed in the certainty that God's word is effective.

• In no way can the Church restrict her pastoral work to the "ordinary maintenance" of those who already know the Gospel of Christ. Missionary outreach is a clear sign of the maturity of an ecclesial community (apostolate ad fideam)

• The word of God is the saving truth everybody wants to hear

• On the one hand the word must communicate everything the Lord himself has told us. On the other hand, it is indispensable, through witness, to make this word credible, lest it appear merely as a beautiful philosophy or utopia, rather than a reality that can be lived and itself give life (apostolate)

• Young people need to be introduced to the word of God "through encounter and authentic witness by adults, through the positive influence of friends and the gat company of the ecclesial community"



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El hombre de Villa Tevere. Chapter 8

St. Josemaria is a great communicator who, wanting to help everybody to get closer to God (from 100 souls, the 100) does apostolate with each person he meets, wherever he goes, adapting the way he tells things to each person, to his or her capacity.

He is a great friend to his friends, never forgetting them, always looking for ways to make them have a good time, like to a Cardinal friend of his for whom he asked some "MU sweets" which were quite cheap but the Cardinal liked a lot. Of course, he had them very nicely wrapped as well.

His interest for people's good would go from A to Z, from the gypsy "enchinador" who was almost drunk when called to meet him, to Walt Disney who like "The Way".

Telling the truth clearly to his friends, like to a priest friend of his who, when the Spanish Civil War was about to start, had decided to stay indoors to do a lot of studies instead of going out to help people (mainly spiritually).

He was a wonderful communicator, with love, gift of tongues and a lot of good humor and struggle as well.

He is confident 100% sure that the truth which he knows is true, but he respects and blesses other peoples beliefs, thus when he talks he says "I believe...". Like to a group of Japanse ladies who visited him and told them to pray for him and gave them a blessing as a priest, even if some of them were not Catholic, nor Christian.