Prayer for the Extraordinary Missionary Month October 2019

Heavenly Father,

when your only begotten Son Jesus Christ

rose from the dead,

he commissioned his followers

to “go and make disciples of all nations”

and you remind us that through our Baptism

we are made sharers in the mission of the Church.

Empower us by the gifts of the Holy Spirit

to be courageous and zealous

in bearing witness to the Gospel,

so that the mission entrusted to the Church,

which is still very far from completion,

may find new and efficacious expressions

that bring life and light to the world.

Help us make it possible for all peoples

to experience the saving love

and mercy of Jesus Christ,

who lives and reigns with you

in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

One God, forever and ever.

Amen.

Extraordinary Missionary Month October 2019 (EMMOCT2019) - Baptised and Sent

Extraordinary Missionary Month October 2019 (EMMOCT2019) inaugurated by Pope Francis in St. Peter's Basilica on 1 October 2019. The holy father Pope Francis ask the whole Church to live an extraordinary time of missionary activity. The EMMOCT2019 is in conjunction with 100th anniversary of Pope Benedict XV's Apostolic Letter Maximum Illud, a document on the Church’s mission to bring to the world the salvation of Jesus Christ. The EMMOCT2019 launched on 1 October, the feast of Saint Therese of Lisieux, patroness of the Missions together with Saint Francis Xavier, and has its culmination in the celebration of World Mission Sunday marked this year on 20 October. “Baptised and Sent: The Church of Christ on Mission in the World” is the theme chosen by Pope Francis for the EMMOCT2019.

There are four dimensions, specified by the Pope, to live more intensely the journey of preparation for the Extraordinary Missionary Month October 2019:

1. A personal encounter with Jesus Christ alive in His Church through the Eucharist, the Word of God, personal and communal prayer;
2. Testimony: missionary saints, martyrs and confessors of the faith, as an expression of the Church scattered throughout the world;
3. Missionary formation: biblical, catechetical, spiritual and theological;
4. Missionary charity.