“Speaking the truth in love: Veritatem facientes in caritate (Eph. 4:15)” is the theme of World Communications Day 2023. In the Vatican press release, the Pope says that we must “speak with meekness, using the gift of communication as a bridge and not as a wall.”
The invitation captures his desire for a media system that knows how to go against the tide, especially in a time marked–even in ecclesial life–by polarization and exaggerated debates that exacerbate tempers.
“It should be a type of communication that is open to dialogue with the other,” the Pope continues, “that promotes integral disarmament, that strives to dismantle the ‘war psychosis’ that lurks in our hearts…. This effort is required of everyone, but in particular of communication workers, who are called to carry out their profession as a mission to build a more just, more fraternal, more humane future.”
On the day on which the Church celebrates the Feast of the Archangels, including the Archangel Gabriel, patron of communications, the Pope also let it be known that Valdir José De Castro, former superior general of the Society of St. Paul, who was appointed Bishop of Campo Limpo, Brazil on 14 September 2022, will be one of the new members of the Vatican Dicastery for Communication.