In 2022, three of the four Pontifical Mission Societies will mark important anniversaries.
It will mark the bicentennial of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith, founded by the Venerable Pauline Marie Jaricot and
the centennial of Pope Pius XI’s motu proprio Romanorum Pontificum designating three of the four Societies as Pontifical: Propagation of the Faith, Holy Childhood, and St. Peter the Apostle for the formation of indigenous clergy in mission territories.
Pope Francis, in his message, addressed the Pontifical Mission Societies during their General Assembly in 2020, reaffirmed that the Societies “were recognized by the Church of Rome and her Bishops, who in the last century sought to adopt them as a unique expression of their own service to the universal Church.”
In this way, the Societies received the “Pontifical” designation and from that moment on, their fundamental feature was to be an instrument of service in support of particular Churches, in their task of proclaiming the Gospel. The Pontifical Mission Societies continue to offer themselves with docility as an instrument of service to the Church, within the universal ministry carried out by the Pope and by the Church of Rome, which ‘presides in charity”.
The Pontifical Mission Societies are committed to encouraging the participation of all the baptized in their international network of prayer, formation, and charity at the service of the Holy Father in his solicitude for the proclamation of the Gospel and the growth of the Young Churches in mission territories. Indeed, the Holy Father reminds us in the same message that the “Missionary Societies, which in time became a network spread throughout the world, mirror in their own configuration the variety of accents, situations, problems, and gifts that characterize the life of the Church in the various parts of the world. …. In this sense, the PMS reflect the mystery of the universality of the Church, in which the incessant work of the Holy Spirit creates harmony from different voices, even as the Bishop of Rome, in his service of charity, exercised also
through the Pontifical Mission Societies, safeguards unity in faith.
