The challenge of the Third Millennium: to be a heart for humanity

Just as St. Daniel Comboni, fixing his gaze on the pierced side of Christ the Good Shepherd, found his own heart pierced by the tragedy of the situation of "unhappy Africa"; so too the Comboni Missionaries of today, fixing their gaze on the Pierced Heart of Jesus, are given the ministry to make themselves a heart for humanity: the heart of fathers and brothers, pierced by the neglect and marginalisation of the Continent of Africa and other Nigrizia situations. A heart that overflows with compassion, pity and love for wounded humanity, in the persons of the outcasts and the poorest on earth.
The path opened by St. Daniel Comboni, although now more than a century old, still today presents all its urgency and drama.
The time is come! This is the hour! Comboni seems to repeat these words. It is a time for renewed commitment to the rebirth of all the Africas...
It is the hour for dialogue with the other great religions of the East, with Islam and with the traditional religions of Africa and of the Afro-Amerindians.
It is the hour to welcome and dwell peacefully and respectfully with the stranger, the one who is different, the outcast and the refugee.
It if the hour for fraternal love and the spirit of inclusion.
It is the hour of justice and truth.
It is the hour for the inculturation of the Gospel.
It is the hour for love...
That is why the appeal of St. Daniel Comboni on his death-bed is as real and topical today as it was then: "Have courage in this difficult time, and even more in the future. Do no stop. Never give up. Face any storm without fear. I am dying, but my work will not die."