Fortnight for Freedom--The Freedom to Bear Witness

Today begins the Fortnight of Freedom in many Archdiocese/diocese in the United States.  This campaign was started four years ago by the United States Bishops to raise awareness that our religious liberties are in constant danger in the US and that Christians abroad are still being persecuted for their faith.  This year's theme is the "Freedom to Bear Witness," focusing on the freedom to bear witness to the truth of the Gospel.  The USCCB website has many resources available for the Fortnight of Freedom to help make US Christian aware of the dangers our modern society poses to religious freedom.

From the USCCB website:

The Fortnight for Freedom: Freedom to Bear Witness will take place from June 21 to July 4, 2015, a time when our liturgical calendar celebrates a series of great martyrs who remained faithful in the face of persecution by political power—St. Thomas More and St. John Fisher, St. John the Baptist, SS. Peter and Paul, and the First Martyrs of the Church of Rome. The theme of this year's Fortnight will focus on the "freedom to bear witness" to the truth of the Gospel.

"[A] healthy pluralism...does not entail privatizing religions in an attempt to reduce them to the quiet obscurity of the individual's conscience or to relegate them to the enclosed precincts of churches, synagogues or mosques."  --Pope Francis, Evanelii Gaudium (The Joy of the Gospel), para. 255.

O GOD OUR CREATOR,
from Your provident hand we have received our right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  You have called us as Your people and given us the right and the duty to worship You, the only true God, and your Son, Jesus Christ.  Through the power and the working of your Holy Spirit, You call us to live out our faith in the midst of the world, bringing the light and the saving truth of the Gospel to every corner of society.

We ask You to bless us in our vigilance for the gift of religious liberty.  Give us the strength of mind and heart to readily defend our freedoms when they are threatened; give us courage in making our voices heard on behalf of the rights of Your Church and the freedom of conscience of all people of faith.

Grant, we pray, O heavenly Father, a clear and united voice to all your sons and daughters gathered in Your Church in this decisive hour in the history of our nation, so that, with every trial withstood and every danger overcome--for the sake of our children, our grandchildren, and all who come after us--this great land will always be "one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

We ask this through Christ our Lord.

Amen.

Prayer and image: Copyright 2012, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Washington, DC. All rights reserved. 

"I cannot fail to recall the many instances of injustice and persecution which daily afflict religious minorities, and Christians in particular, in various parts of our world. Communities and individuals today find themselves subjected to barbaric acts of violence: they are evicted from their homes and native lands, sold as slaves, killed, beheaded, crucified or burned alive, under the shameful and complicit silence of so many." --Pope Francis, Address to the European Parliament, Nov. 25, 2014