The following is the text of the Pope’s video with the prayer intention for the month of October, disseminated via the Pope’s Worldwide Prayer Network, on the theme Let us pray that the Church continue to sustain a synodal lifestyle in every way, as a sign of co-responsibility, promoting the participation, communion and mission shared by priests, religious and laity:

Video Message of the Holy Father

We Christians are all responsible for the Church’s mission. Every priest. Everyone.

We priests are not the bosses of the laity, but their pastors. Jesus called us, one and others – not one above others, or one on one side and others on another side, but complementing each other. We are community. That is why we need to walk together, taking the path of synodality.

Sure, you could ask me, what can I do as a bus driver? A farmer? A fisher? What all of us need to do is to witness with our lives. Be co-responsible for the Church’s mission.

The laity, the baptized are in the Church, in their own home, and need to take care of it. So do we priests and consecrated persons. Everyone contributes what they know how to do best. We are co-responsible in mission, we participate and we live in the communion of the Church.

Let us pray that the Church continue to sustain a synodal lifestyle in every way, as a sign of co-responsibility, promoting the participation, communion and mission shared by priests, religious and laity.