Pope Francis has praised John Wesley for leading people to “knowledge of Jesus Christ”.
The founder of Methodism brought many people to Christ through prayer and Bible reading, Pope Francis said.
Speaking to leaders of the World Methodist Council last week, Pope Francis praised 50 years of dialogue between the Catholic and Methodist churches.
In the Old Testament, a golden jubilee was a moment to free slaves, the Pope said. He added: “we too have been freed from the slavery of estrangement and mutual suspicion”.
“We are no longer strangers,” he said, but rather, through our shared baptism, “members of the household of God”.
Speaking about John Wesley, the 18th-century Anglican clergyman who founded the Methodist movement, Pope Francis said his example converted many people to God.
We cannot fail to rejoice when the Holy Spirit works through other Christian denominations, the Pope said, as they “also help us grow closer to the Lord”.
Pope Francis said that faith becomes tangible when it takes the concrete form of love and service to the poor and marginalised. When Methodists and Catholics work together to assist those who are alienated or in need, they are responding to the Lord’s summons, he said. He hoped that the dialogue encouraged Christians everywhere to become “ministers of reconciliation”, adding that we cannot grow in holiness without “growing in communion”.
He asked his listeners to “prepare ourselves with humble hope and concrete efforts for that full recognition which will enable us to join one another in the breaking of bread together.”
Shrewsbury parish welcomes families fleeing Syrian war
A parish in the Diocese of Shrewsbury is to welcome at least two families of refugees from the Syrian war.
The Church of Our Lady and St Christopher in Romiley, near Stockport, will be the first in the diocese to work with the Government in resettling about 20,000 refugees from camps along the Syrian border.
It follows the success of a project in the neighbouring Diocese of Salford, where St Monica’s Church, Flixton has already welcomed a family
from Syria.
The project also represents part of a new focus on social justice and action in Shrewsbury diocese following the launch of the local Caritas agency last year.
The initiative will involve befriending the families and helping them to integrate into society over a two-year period.
Canon Michael Gannon, parish priest and vicar general, said he hoped other parishes in the diocese would follow suit.
He said: “The whole concept is about creating missionary parishes and responding to the call of Pope Francis to have that missionary call. We are very much up for it.” He said he was “determined to see this through, and I know I am supported here.”
Archbishop dedicates diocese
Archbishop Leo Cushley has consecrated the Archdiocese of St Andrews and Edinburgh to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in Fatima, Portugal, on the 100th anniversary of Our Lady’s appearance there to three local shepherd children.
The consecration came at the end of a Mass in the Chapel of Apparitions, the location of the Marian apparitions in 1917.
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