Greetings from the PRESIDENT to Speaker HIS MOST REVEREND EXC. MONS. MAURO PIACENZA

Greetings from the PRESIDENT OF THE APOSTOLIC MOVEMENT

to Speaker HIS MOST REVEREND EXC. MONS. MAURO PIACENZA

Titular Archbishop of Victoriana

SECRETARY OF THE CONGREGATION FOR THE CLERGY

Your Excellency, with great joy, combined with feelings of faith and gratitude, I offer on behalf, of the Inspirer and Founder, of all the Apostolic Movement and on my own, the most cordial welcome. Your presence, other than being a source of spiritual wealth, gives this our Ecclesial Convention III a breath of the universal Church, since through you, Secretary of a Pontifical Ministry, we feel even more united to the Person and Mission of the Supreme Pontiff. As Bishop of the Church of Christ and member of the Episcopal College, You have in your heart the care for the whole Church, which you expresses through your service in the Congregation for the Clergy. Yours is a highly and quite delicate ecclesiastical ministry, since the office you hold and the powers proper of the Congregation of the Clergy are a sign of collegiate fondness and fraternal communion among the Bishops of the world, the Priests and the Pope.

We celebrate this our convention in proximity of an ecclesial event of considerable extent, the XII Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, strongly willed by Pope Benedict XVI, who will reflect on the theme “The Word of God in the life and mission of the Church.” As a result of this authoritative Assembly, the Movement awaits with faith the Post-Synodal Exhortation that the goodness of the Holy Father, Sure guide in the truth of Christ, will offer to the whole Church.

Excellency, in one of your interventions, in April 2007 entitled “Cultural Heritage of the Church and evangelization”, you stated: “The Church believes that in the Incarnation of Jesus Christ, the invisible life of God has become” visible” to men. She also believes that the testimony given to this life “which was with the Father and was made manifest to us” (1 Jn 1, 2), serves to draw people into the ecclesial and Trinitarian communion.” That is what the Apostolic Movement intends to do: through the work of evangelization and charity, visibly manifesting Jesus Christ present and operating in the world and promoting that fellowship that must characterize the children of God.

The Apostolic Movement, founded in Catanzaro November 3, 1979, through the Inspirer and Founder, Mrs. Maria Marino; is an aggregation of lay faithful that has the charisma of the remembrance and announcement of the Word of Jesus. All its adhering members, in the spirit of Christifideles Laici, share the charisma of the Inspirer and live it in simplicity, according to the gifts of grace that the good God has bestowed on each. Every member of the Movement is committed to the personal holiness; with the help of God’s grace and the light of His truth, does his best in confessing rightly the faith the Fathers transmitted us, living the obedience to the faith and fellowship with the Church’s Pastors, Teachers of the Word and Authoritative guides of the ecclesial community; and collaborates in a spirit of brotherhood with all other associations and ecclesial movements. The Apostolic Movement does not have its own means of sanctification, but only the means that the Holy Church offers it; it has no personal Apostolic ends but the one of the Church; it has no autonomous life but the vital lymph of the Church.

To all of you who wanted to participate in this III Ecclesial Convention of the Apostolic Movement, Excellencies the Bishops, Civil and Military Authorities, Reverend Priests, Religious, Religious, secular Consecrate, representatives of groups, movements and associations, the Holy People of God, I thank staff and all the Apostolic Movement.

We entrust to His Person, Excellency, the love of the Father, the grace of Christ and the Spirit’s action. The Virgin Mary, Mother of the Redemption, the wrap with her mantle of love and mercy. The Saints and Angels protect and guard it, intercede with the Lord for His episcopate is always full of heavenly blessings. Thanks Excellence.

Catanzaro, September 27, 2008

Cettina Marraffa
President of the Apostolic Movement

(Catanzaro: Politeama Theatre – 27 September, 2008)