Meeting Pope Francis

CLIFTON  Working for the missions is a privilege according to Mila Burdeos, diocesan mission coordinator, who has worked in the diocesan Mission Office for 19 years.

“When we help the missions we are given the opportunity to help people literally all around the world,” said Burdeos.

With that privileged work, Burdeos recently returned from the “eternal city” of Rome, where she attended the National Mission Conference, which was a meeting of directors and coordinators of the Diocesan Mission Offices throughout the United States. These mission offices serve the Pontifical Mission Societies, which is under the jurisdiction of the Pope, and the Catholic Church’s official support organization for overseas mission. The Pontifical Mission Societies consist of four organizations — the Society for the Propagation of the Faith, the Society of St. Peter the Apostle, the Holy Childhood Association and the Missionary Union of Priests and Religious.

More than 75 mission directors and coordinators attended the meeting called “Missio Ad Limini: To the Threshold of the Apostle.” They were led by Oblate Father Andrew Smalls, national director of the Pontifical Mission Societies in the U.S., and they visited and attended Mass in many of Italy’s famous basilicas such as St. Mary Major Basilica and St. John Lateran Basilica, both in Rome and the Basilica of St. Francis in Assisi.

As members of the Propagation of Faith, which assists the work of Catholic missionaries in mission countries, the work of these mission offices throughout the U.S. helps more than 1,100 dioceses throughout Asia, Africa, parts of Latin American and Europe and Islands of the Pacific so that those in mission lands hear the Gospel message.

Because of the work of Diocesan Mission Offices, which are committed to inspiring the U.S. faithful to give financially to support mission work, it is possible for local priests, religious and catechists at the ends of the earth to reach out to communities, families and children in desperate need and allowing them to know Jesus Christ, even in difficult living circumstances. In thanksgiving for this work, Cardinal Fernando Filoni, prefect of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples, met with the U.S. mission coordinators. During the meeting, they learned about the mission projects around the world supported through the generosity of Catholics in the U.S. These projects include building new churches and schools, medical missions, education and training religious sisters and seminarians and caring for the sick.

Burdeos said, “We were all received with much gratitude and appreciation for all the prayers and support the people in United States have been sending for the world missions. They held presentations and receptions for us. I felt they could not thank us enough for all the financial support the U.S. has given to continue spreading the Gospel message in the world.”

As part of the conference in Rome, the U.S. mission coordinators were invited to sit in a special section for the Pope’s General Audience on May 10. Burdeos felt especially blessed because both she and Father Arkad Biczak, mission director of the Diocese of Santa Fe, N.M., were chosen to meet Pope Francis, something neither of them expected.

“When I spoke to our Holy Father, I asked him to bless our Bishop (Serratelli), who is very mission-minded, our priests and all missionaries around the world and the works of the Pontifical Mission Societies in the USA,” she said. “I asked him to pray that we may work harder and better for evangelization and world missions.”

Carrying religious articles, Burdeos also ask the Pope to bless them and said, “That moment to speak with the Pope was a very special gift from God and Mary that I will never forget as long as I live. His presence made me felt so close to Jesus and Mary.”

But this wasn’t the first time Burdeos met a Pope. In 2003, she also got to speak with St. John Paul II during the mission conference, saying of her experience: “I can’t believe I met a future saint.”

While Burdeos got the opportunity to met Pope Francis during the conference, she said meeting with the different mission directors around the country was just as meaningful. “We learn a lot from each other. We share how we can make our work stronger and let the faith be more of a presence in the world.”

[Information: www.missio.org.]