[MajestyJo]

1 Today sees the start of the Week of Prayer
for Christian Unity.
2 Pope John XXIII (the twenty-third) was
Pope in the early 1960s and he did a lot
for world peace at the time of the Cuban
Missile Crisis that almost became World
War III. He is also well-known for being
very keen to bring closer together Christians
of different churches. He said:
“In essential things - unity;
in unimportant things - freedom;
in all things - charity.”
3 The end of Church Unity Week on the
25th is the anniversary (in 1959) of the
announcement by Pope John that he
would call together all the Catholic bishops
across the world to look at bringing
the Church up-to-date, “to let in some air
and blow away the dust”. That meeting
would be called “The Second Vatican
Council”
4 Pope John wrote a prayer which we will
make our own today:
“Renew in our own days
your miracles
like a second Pentecost.
Grant that the Church,
re-united in prayer,
may extend the kingdom of Jesus
- a kingdom of truth and justice,
of love and peace.
Amen.”