In gratitude for Pope Francis’ Letter Prædicator Gratiæ

Faced with the profound transformations that mark the contemporary world, the Pope once again underlines the need for a renewal of evangelization. In this year of thanksgiving, he encourages us and all the baptized to inscribe ourselves in what was Dominic’s missionary impulse, animated by a hope for the world and for mankind.

A hope for the world, whose name could be communion. The point of departure of Dominic’s apostolic impulse was in fact the choice to return to the way in which the first Christian communities, in poverty and simplicity of life, gave a sign of communion. Even today, it is this choice that can best dispose us to be, like Jesus, moved by compassion in the face of the fractures that disfigure and divide the world. Compassion, then, puts at the heart of missionary disciples the desire to give themselves to serve communion among men, and the courage to go and proclaim the Gospel of mercy to the most distant, the most despised and those who are the most alienated from the faith. In the school of Dominic, Francis emphasizes, evangelization is intrinsically linked to the hope that a new world can be born where justice and peace are embraced, and where the dignity and rights of each person and of peoples are recognized, protected and promoted. Bearers of this hope of communion for the world, we are today more than ever invited to open together, brothers and sisters and lay people (whose important role in evangelization the Pope underlines), new paths for evangelization: it is by walking together with all, proclaiming the good news, that the Church becomes a sign of communion for the world.

A hope for mankind. The Pope recalls that, taking the road of evangelization, “Brother Dominic”, as did Francis of Assisi, entrusted his Order and his family with a treasure that gives all its strength to such a missionary drive: the treasure of fraternity. Learning together to become brothers and sisters in the name of the Gospel, to be as familiar as possible with our contemporaries and to awaken in them this same desire. To become brothers and sisters, and thus, echoing the “Salamanca moment”, to be all the more sensitive to the calls to commit one’s life to promoting the dignity and rights of persons and peoples in all the fractured places of the world. To be brothers and friends of people in order to build with them that “common house” where all can be happy to live together. To be brothers and sisters, to study and search for the truth, in friendly dialogue with others, and in the concern to serve the intelligence in faith. Fraternity with all, fraternity in Christ, which teaches us to hold charity and truth together, and thus grow in the friendship of God.

Brothers and sisters for communion! It is with deep gratitude to Pope Francis that we can hear his invitation to renew our joy in the impulse of Dominic, preacher of the Gospel of grace!   

Brother Bruno Cadoré, OP
Master of the Order, 2010-2019