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"If people cast us off as fanatics, then they cast us off as fanatics," O'Donnell said. "But that's part of what being a prophetic witness is, to be able to say something is the truth. Whether or not people listen doesn't matter to us. We're called to speak it and live it."

Sink, please pardon my ignorance. I was educated by Dominicans, not Franciscans, and I've never heard the term "prophetic witness" used by Catholics. "Witness" yes, but not "prophetic." Is that term common with Franciscans?

America needs "prophetic witness," Pope says

Vatican, May. 28, 2004 (CWNews.com) - Pope John Paul II (bio - news) reminded American bishops of their duty to maintain a "prophetic witness" in a society threatened by materialism, as he met with a group of bishops from the Midwestern US who were completing their ad limina visits.

The Holy Father met on May 28 with bishops from the ecclesiastical provinces of Indianapolis, Chicago, and Milwaukee. They were the seventh group of bishops from the US to make their ad limina visits this year.

The Pope said that the US bishops' conference has fulfilled an important responsibility by issuing clear statements on "controversial social questions such as respect for human life, problems of justice and peace, immigration, the defense of family values and the sanctity of marriage." But he urged a still more energetic approach "to confront directly the widespread spirit of agnosticism and relativism."

In the absence of clear and courageous teaching about eternal truths, the Pontiff said, America is in grave danger of "yielding to a purely materialistic and soulless vision of the world.” The Pope called for "the mobilization of the Church's resources for the work of evangelization."

The American laity have a particularly important role in the "prophetic mission," the Pope continued. They should continue their own work of evangelization into "the different spheres of family, social, professional, and cultural life."

'The Word of God must not be enchained," the Pope said. "It must resound before the world in all its liberating truth."

,i>Sink, please pardon my ignorance. I was educated by Dominicans, not Franciscans, and I've never heard the term "prophetic witness" used by Catholics. "Witness" yes, but not "prophetic." Is that term common with Franciscans?

I was taught by Franciscans and Jesuits. Neither used the term "prohetic witness" that I can recall.