Pope Francis: Church Doors Must Stay Open

There has been a visible increase in security around the Vatican following the Paris attacks and ahead of Pope Francis’ big Jubilee Year, which opens December 8. “Jesus tells us that he stands knocking at our door, asking that we open it to Him”, he said.

“There are still places in the world where doors are not locked, but there are also many where reinforced doors have become normal”. We must not accept the idea of having to apply this system to our whole life, to life within the family, in the city, in society, and far less so in the life of the Church…. An inhospitable church – just like a family closed inside itself – mortifies the Gospel and parches dry the world.

Francis himself alluded to the security situation in his remarks to the crowd of about 20,000, saying the church must always keep its doors open.

“The symbolic management of doors – thresholds, passages, frontiers – has become crucial”.

“In order for cloistered communities to accomplish their important mission, in prayer and silent work, let us not be lacking in our spiritual and material closeness to them”. “The door says many things about the house, and also the Church”.

Francis also said that while doors must be guarded, the guards should also open the doors to see who is outside. “We can’t succumb to the logic of fear”.

Like the sheepfold, where God’s people are gathered, the pope said, “the house of God is a shelter, not a prison”.

“The sheep are not chosen by the watchman, the sheep are not chosen by the parish secretary”, he continued. The guardian too obeys the voice of the Shepherd.

“The church is the doorman of the house of the Lord, the church is the doorman – it is not the master of the house of the Lord!” he cried out.

The Pope reminded his audience that the Holy Family of Nazareth knew the sorrow of encountering doors closed to those in need.

“May Christian families make the thresholds of their homes a “small great” sign of the door of mercy and welcoming of God”, Francis asked.

The recent Synod of Bishops on the family was an occasion to encourage the church and all Catholics to meet God at this open door and to open their own doors to others – “to go out with the Lord” to encounter his children who are journeying, who are perhaps uncertain, perhaps lost, “in these hard times”, he said.

“If the door of God’s mercy is always open”, we must leave the doors of our institutions open so that “we can go out carrying God’s mercy”.

The Trade Union was instrumental in the fall of Communism in Poland.