I address parents as well. May faith and readiness never be lacking in your hearts, if the Lord should bless you by calling a son or a daughter to missionary service. May you give thanks to God! Indeed, see that this call is prepared through family prayer, through education rich in spirit and enthusiasm, through participation in parochial and diocesan activities, through involvement in associations and volunteer work.

To be instruments of the heavenly Father in the work of forming their own children-here is found the inviolable limit that parents must respect in carrying out their mission. They must never consider themselves "owners" of their children, but rather they must educate them, paying constant attention to the privileged relationship that their children have with their Father in heaven. In the last analysis, as with Jesus, it is His business that they must "be about" more than that of their earthly parents.