It seems that nothing escapes this humble Jesuit Pope! Pope Francis thoroughly believes that everything can be revitalised in Jesus Christ provided that one injects Christ’s humbling and generous love in what he says and does. One such aspect is certainly the parish community.

For Pope Francis the parish is the centre of evangelisation. Let us not forget that Christianity’s main concern is certainly not about passing on a series of precepts or moralisms. On the contrary Christianity is about presenting a living and engaging faith based on the Divine Love that stems from the Trinitarian Communion.

In his inspiring and challenging apostolic letter, Evangelii Gaudium, Pope Francis bluntly says that “the parish is not an outdated institution; precisely because it possesses great flexibility, it can assume quite different contours depending on the openness and missionary creativity of the pastor and the community.”

But, as the Holy Father is evidently hinting at, everything depends on the priorities which that particular parish puts on its pastoral agenda.

The first priority that every parish must have is that of offering effective ways to quench the existential thirst for God that modern society surely harbours.

How are we going to transform our parishes into places wherein, in the Pope’s words, “healing, liberation, life, peace, fraternal communion and missionary fruitfulness” will come alive?

In this year’s Lenten message Pope Francis ardently expressed his wish that our parishes would be centres wherein Christian compassion is freely and abundantly given. “How greatly I desire that all those places where the Church is present, especially our parishes and our communities, may become islands of mercy in the midst of the sea of indifference!”

How will our parish let Jesus preach to her and heal her by the poor?

Do we realise that the poor help us treat each other in the parish with love and compassion?