Pope: Catholics in the Americas must reach out to people with Gospel

Published: 2003-11-26

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Millions of people in the world are yearning for meaning in their lives, Pope John Paul II said, and Catholics in North and South America must reach out to them with the Gospel. "Show your desire to be joyful witnesses and enthusiastic apostles of the Gospel to the ends of the earth with the example of your holy lives," the pope told some 3,200 people gathered in Guatemala City for the American Missionary Congress. Pope John Paul sent a message to the Nov. 25-30 gathering of bishops, clergy, religious and lay people, who met to coordinate and increase missionary activity among the continent's Catholics. "Millions of men and women who do not know Christ or have only a superficial knowledge of him live in the hope -- at times, unconsciously -- of discovering the truth about man and about God and about the way which leads to liberation from sin and from death," the pope said.

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