Catholics around Australia have last week been asked and encouraged to support the Peter’s Pence appeal on Sunday 30 June, after the Feast of St Peter and St Paul.
Donations to the appeal, which goes back to Medieval times, support Pope Francis’ mission from the proclamation of the Gospel to the promotion of integral human development, education and peace.
Peter’s Pence also aims to support a range of charities which bring aid and comfort to the poor, children, families, the elderly, the marginalised, victims of war and natural disasters, refugees and migrants.
In recent times this support has gone to people in Ukraine, Lithuania, Tanzania, the Philippines, Iraq, Haiti, the Republic of Congo, South Sudan and Brazil among other countries.
Catholics are also invited to offer special prayer for the Pope.
The Holy Father said in a message for Peter’s Pence 2024: “The hope that we have been given never divides us from others. Instead, it is an extraordinary gift of which we are called to make ourselves ‘channels’, with humility and simplicity, for everyone. So our boastfulness is because we have as Father a God who opens his house to all human beings, beginning with the least and the most distant, so that as his children we may learn to console and support one another.”
The Vatican’s Secretariat for the Economy, which publicly reports on donations, describes Peter’s Pence as “the financial support offered by the faithful to the Holy Father as a sign of their shared concern with the Successor of Peter in addressing the necessities of the Universal Church and to help those most in need”.
Resources for parishes seeking to take part in the appeal can be found here: English (obolodisanpietro.va)