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Legion HANDBOOK D10944_1 26/02/2014 15:53 Page 74

74 THE EXTERNAL AIMS OF THE LEGION CHAPTER 12
Thus the Legion begins by bringing its members together to
persevere with one mind in prayer with their Queen. Then it
sends them into the sinful and sorrowful places, there to do a
good work, and by catching fire in the doing to do a greater.
Finally it looks out over the highways and byways of the
everyday life as the object of a still more glorious mission.
Knowing what has been done by limited numbers, reflecting
that the potential material for its ranks is almost beyond
number, believing that its system, if vigorously utilised by the
Church, affords a strangely efficacious way of purifying a
sinful world, the Legion yearns exceedingly for the
multiplication of its members, that it may be legion in
number as in name.
Between those working actively, those giving auxiliary
service and those being worked for, the whole population can
be embraced, and raised from the level of neglect or routine
to that of enthusiastic membership of the Church. Consider
what this can mean to village or town; no longer merely in
the Church, but a driving force in it, sending directly or
through the Communion of Saints its impulses to the ends of
the earth, and into the dark places thereof. What an ideal — a
whole population organised for God! And yet this is no mere
ideal. It is the most practical and possible thing in the world
to-day — if eyes are but uplifted and arms unfolded.
“Yes, the laity are a ‘chosen race, a holy priesthood’, also called to
be ‘the salt of the earth’ and ‘the light of the world’. It is their specific
vocation and mission to express the Gospel in their lives and thereby
to insert the Gospel as a leaven into the reality of the world in which
they live and work. The great forces which shape the world —
politics, the mass media, science, technology, culture, education,
industry and work — are precisely the areas where lay people are
especially competent to exercise their mission. If these forces are
guided by people who are true disciples of Christ, and who are, at the
same time, fully competent in the relevant secular knowledge and
skill, then indeed will the world be transformed from within by
Christ’s redeeming power.” (Bl. John Paul II’s address in Limerick,
Ireland, October 1979)

3. TO WELD ALL TOGETHER
This seeking “first for the kingdom of God and His righteous -
ness” (Mt 6:33), that is, its direct labours for souls, absorbs the
Legion altogether. Nevertheless, it must not be overlooked