"I am pleased to realize that one of the pastoral initiatives considered among the most urgent for the Church in Ecuador is the accomplishment of the ‘great mission’ called by the Latin American Episcopate in Aparecida, and confirmed by the third American Missionary Congress, celebrated in Quito during the last month of August". Benedict XVI said that this morning, on receiving the bishops of the Bishops’ Conference of Ecuador, paying ad limina visit. "The call which Jesus, our Lord, addressed to His disciples, inviting them to preach His message of salvation and to make all peoples His disciples went on the Pope, should be a reason for constant meditation for the whole ecclesial community, and the reason for the existence of the whole pastoral action". The bishops of Ecuador have to tackle numerous challenges, linked with "a cultural and social environment that seems to forget the deepest spiritual reasons of one’s identity". The Holy Father suggested the bishops to open their hearts "obediently to the action of the Holy Spirit", in order to renew "the missionary ardour of the beginning of the evangelical preaching, as well as the first announcement of the Gospel in your land".
