ROME MISSIONARY CONGRESS

THE POPE OF THE MISSIONS A Call To Priests
The Missionary Union of the Clergy held its Second International Congress in Rome last week.
The Union is entirely one of priests and for the purpose of helping the missions. Many of its 160,000 members are to be found in France and Italy. The Union has not yet spread in this country, which was unrepresented at the recent Second Congress.
The importance attached by the Holy Father to the Union and its work was shown in a long speech of over an hour made by the Pope when he received the members of the Union on Friday.
The Archbishop of Ferrara, the President of the Italian section, showed clearly how close to the spirit of the present Pontificate was the work of helping the missions.
" If no other epoch has seen so much activity in the service of the Catholic mix
sion,s," he said, " it is due to the two Pontiffs, Benedict XV and Pius XI. The great EncyclicalS Maximum Illud and Rerum Ecclesiae, as well as many other acts, have stimulated Catholic efforts for the missions. The recent Encyclical Ad Catholici Sacerdotii recalled especially to priests their ' missionary duty.'" The Pope's Allocution The same lesson was expounded at great length by the Holy Father in his allocution of Friday.
"It is no exaggeration," he said, " but exact truth, that the priesthood of Christ is an essentially missionary priesthood. This truth is not only recorded in Christ's phrase,' sent by the Father,' but on every other occasion when Our Lord speaks of his mission: ' As the Father sent me, so do I send you.' Thus Jesus was the first missionary."
In another part of his speech the Pope described the work of the missions as " a true golden mass of authentic Divine value," and referred to the Congress as one which was described by his great prede cessor, Leo the Great, as " so great, so important that it therefore imposes the silence of veneration and meditation."
In opening the Congress in the presence of seven Cardinals, a hundred Bishops, and seven to eight hundred priests, Cardinal Fumasoni-Biondi emphasised the need of the Union and the greatness of its work.