Pope warns against losing smell of sheep

(ANSA) - Vatican City, May 4 - Pope Francis in his weekly general audience on Wednesday invoked the parable of the pastor who leaves his 99 sheep in the desert to search for the one lost from the fold, warning Christians not to "close themselves in a pen where there is no longer the smell of sheep but rather a musty smell".
    "We musn't close ourselves up, because we have a musty smell, we need to go out, this closing ourselves up in the parish, in the small community, we, the so-called 'right ones', in our strategies," Pope Francis said.
    "The pastor will be found where the lost sheep is, the Lord then must be looked for where he wants to find us, not where we think we'll find him, where there's mercy," he said.
    "God doesn't know our current throwaway culture, God has nothing to do with this, God doesn't throw anyone away," Pope Francis said.