Porta Fidei 7: Love Impels Evangelization

7. “Caritas Christi urget nos” (2 Cor 5:14): it is the love of Christ that fills our hearts and impels us to evangelize. Today as in the past, he sends us through the highways of the world to proclaim his Gospel to all the peoples of the earth (cf. Mt 28:19). Through his love, Jesus Christ attracts to himself the people of every generation: in every age he convokes the Church, entrusting her with the proclamation of the Gospel by a mandate that is ever new. Today too, there is a need for stronger ecclesial commitment to new evangelization in order to rediscover the joy of believing and the enthusiasm for communicating the faith. In rediscovering his love day by day, the missionary commitment of believers attains force and vigour that can never fade away. Faith grows when it is lived as an experience of love received and when it is communicated as an experience of grace and joy. It makes us fruitful, because it expands our hearts in hope and enables us to bear life-giving witness: indeed, it opens the hearts and minds of those who listen to respond to the Lord’s invitation to adhere to his word and become his disciples. Believers, so Saint Augustine tells us, “strengthen themselves by believing”.[De Utilitate Credendi, I:2] The saintly Bishop of Hippo had good reason to express himself in this way. As we know, his life was a continual search for the beauty of the faith until such time as his heart would find rest in God.[Cf. Saint Augustine, Confessions, I:1] His extensive writings, in which he explains the importance of believing and the truth of the faith, continue even now to form a heritage of incomparable riches, and they still help many people in search of God to find the right path towards the “door of faith”.

Only through believing, then, does faith grow and become stronger; there is no other possibility for possessing certitude with regard to one’s life apart from self-abandonment, in a continuous crescendo, into the hands of a love that seems to grow constantly because it has its origin in God.

New mandate, new evangelization, new Church. New is nothing to be concerned about, in the thinking of Saint Augustine. (“Ever ancient, ever new.”)

 

Porta Fidei 6: The Witness of Believers

Lumen Gentium rejected a notion of a clergy-first institution. One of the consequences of starting with the People of God is that naturally the duties and responsibilities of that people are also emphasized. Every believer is called to witness to the Word:

6. The renewal of the Church is also achieved through the witness offered by the lives of believers: by their very existence in the world, Christians are called to radiate the word of truth that the Lord Jesus has left us. The Council itself, in the Dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium, said this: While “Christ, ‘holy, innocent and undefiled’ (Heb 7:26) knew nothing of sin (cf. 2 Cor 5:21), but came only to expiate the sins of the people (cf. Heb 2:17)… the Church … clasping sinners to its bosom, at once holy and always in need of purification, follows constantly the path of penance and renewal. The Church, ‘like a stranger in a foreign land, presses forward amid the persecutions of the world and the consolations of God’, announcing the cross and death of the Lord until he comes (cf. 1 Cor 11:26). But by the power of the risen Lord it is given strength to overcome, in patience and in love, its sorrow and its difficulties, both those that are from within and those that are from without, so that it may reveal in the world, faithfully, although with shadows, the mystery of its Lord until, in the end, it shall be manifested in full light.”(Lumen Gentium, 8.)

In a word, grace. God’s grace enables the Church and its believers to give that shadowed, imperfect witness.

 

Porta Fidei 5: Correct Interpretation and Correct Reading

Pope Benedict values the input of his predecessors.

5. In some respects, my venerable predecessor saw this Year as a “consequence and a necessity of the postconciliar period”,[Paul VI, General Audience (14 June 1967): Insegnamenti V (1967), 801] fully conscious of the grave difficulties of the time, especially with regard to the profession of the true faith and its correct interpretation. It seemed to me that timing the launch of the Year of Faith to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council would provide a good opportunity to help people understand that the texts bequeathed by the Council Fathers, in the words of Blessed John Paul II, “have lost nothing of their value or brilliance. They need to be read correctly, to be widely known and taken to heart as important and normative texts of the Magisterium, within the Church’s Tradition … I feel more than ever in duty bound to point to the Council as the great grace bestowed on the Church in the twentieth century: there we find a sure compass by which to take our bearings in the century now beginning.”[Novo Millennio Ineunte 57] I would also like to emphasize strongly what I had occasion to say concerning the Council a few months after my election as Successor of Peter: “if we interpret and implement it guided by a right hermeneutic, it can be and can become increasingly powerful for the ever necessary renewal of the Church.”[Address to the Roman Curia (22 December 2005): AAS 98 (2006), 52.]

“Correct” is used twice here. This quality occurs when innumerable people discern spiritually and pastorally, the urgings of the Holy Spirit, and the needs of the people of the times. The Magisterium has a role, and a vital one, naturally. But at some point, pastors, catechists, parents, and regular believers must lead and live the life of faith in their own surroundings. Life is so complex; no institution can possibly hope to provide all the easy answers in all situations.

Ideally, believers are given tools to apply church teachings to their life. What would these be? Methods of prayer. Messages of encouragement. Aspects of culture that uplift the mind and heart.

Your comments?

 

Porta Fidei 4: Announcing the Year of Faith

Given the perception of a serious opportunity for spreading the faith, Pope Benedict declared the current Year of Faith:

4. In the light of all this, I have decided to announce a Year of Faith. It will begin on 11 October 2012, the fiftieth anniversary of the opening of the Second Vatican Council, and it will end on the Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, Universal King, on 24 November 2013. The starting date of 11 October 2012 also marks the twentieth anniversary of the publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, a text promulgated by my Predecessor, Blessed John Paul II, [Fidei Depositum] with a view to illustrating for all the faithful the power and beauty of the faith. This document, an authentic fruit of the Second Vatican Council, was requested by the Extraordinary Synod of Bishops in 1985 as an instrument at the service of catechesis[Cf. Final Report of the Second Extraordinary Synod of Bishops (7 December 1985) and it was produced in collaboration with all the bishops of the Catholic Church. Moreover, the theme of the General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops that I have convoked for October 2012 is “The New Evangelization for the Transmission of the Christian Faith”. This will be a good opportunity to usher the whole Church into a time of particular reflection and rediscovery of the faith. It is not the first time that the Church has been called to celebrate a Year of Faith. My venerable Predecessor the Servant of God Paul VI announced one in 1967, to commemorate the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul on the 19^th centenary of their supreme act of witness. He thought of it as a solemn moment for the whole Church to make “an authentic and sincere profession of the same faith”; moreover, he wanted this to be confirmed in a way that was “individual and collective, free and conscious, inward and outward, humble and frank”.[Paul VI, Apostolic Exhortation Petrum et Paulum Apostolos on the XIX centenary of the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul (22 February 1967)] He thought that in this way the whole Church could reappropriate “exact knowledge of the faith, so as to reinvigorate it, purify it, confirm it, and confess it”.[Paul VI, Apostolic Exhortation Petrum et Paulum Apostolos on the XIX centenary of the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul (22 February 1967)] The great upheavals of that year made even more evident the need for a celebration of this kind. It concluded with the Credo of the People of God,[Paul VI, Credo of the People of God, cf.Homily at Mass on the XIX centenary of the martyrdom of Saints Peter and Paul at the conclusion of the “Year of Faith” (30 June 1968)] intended to show how much the essential content that for centuries has formed the heritage of all believers needs to be confirmed, understood and explored ever anew, so as to bear consistent witness in historical circumstances very different from those of the past.

Did you know the last “year of faith” was 1967-68? It was before I became a Catholic. Do these “years” have a lasting impact? Or are we content to conjure anniversaries to make these connections with the past?

Note Pope Benedict’s dim view of 1968. I remember real disasters from those times–Vietnam, Biafra, not just student demonstrations in the First World.

Thoughts?

 

Porta Fidei 3: The Teachings of Christ

What is the Gospel call to faith?

3. We cannot accept that salt should become tasteless or the light be kept hidden (cf. Mt 5:13-16). The people of today can still experience the need to go to the well, like the Samaritan woman, in order to hear Jesus, who invites us to believe in him and to draw upon the source of living water welling up within him (cf. Jn 4:14). We must rediscover a taste for feeding ourselves on the word of God, faithfully handed down by the Church, and on the bread of life, offered as sustenance for his disciples (cf. Jn 6:51). Indeed, the teaching of Jesus still resounds in our day with the same power: “Do not labour for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life” (Jn 6:27). The question posed by his listeners is the same that we ask today: “What must we do, to be doing the works of God?” (Jn 6:28). We know Jesus’ reply: “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent” (Jn 6:29). Belief in Jesus Christ, then, is the way to arrive definitively at salvation.

Jesus teaches that believers must witness to him to the world. We are not an enclosed society, tasteless and silent and hidden from view. Pope Benedict draws out the salvific way as presented very early in John’s Gospel, that we hear the Word, and know God’s grace working in us from a personal encounter with Jesus. After listening and believing, we are offered the sustenance of the Eucharist. Faith is irrevocably intertwined with this sacred meal we celebrate.

 

Porta Fidei 2: Crisis Of Faith

Pope Benedict’s personal assessment comes to the fore here, as one might expect when the references are his own homilies. Let’s read:

2. Ever since the start of my ministry as Successor of Peter, I have spoken of the need to rediscover the journey of faith so as to shed ever clearer light on the joy and renewed enthusiasm of the encounter with Christ. During the homily at the Mass marking the inauguration of my pontificate I said: “The Church as a whole and all her Pastors, like Christ, must set out to lead people out of the desert, towards the place of life, towards friendship with the Son of God, towards the One who gives us life, and life in abundance.”[Homily for the beginning of the Petrine Ministry of the Bishop of Rome (24 April 2005): AAS 97 (2005), 710.] It often happens that Christians are more concerned for the social, cultural and political consequences of their commitment, continuing to think of the faith as a self-evident presupposition for life in society. In reality, not only can this presupposition no longer be taken for granted, but it is often openly denied.[Homily at Holy Mass in Lisbon’s “Terreiro do Paço” (11 May 2010): Insegnamenti VI:1 (2010), 673] Whereas in the past it was possible to recognize a unitary cultural matrix, broadly accepted in its appeal to the content of the faith and the values inspired by it, today this no longer seems to be the case in large swathes of society, because of a profound crisis of faith that has affected many people.

First off, I would agree that the Christian ideal is presented well here: “Christians are more concerned for the social, cultural and political consequences of their commitment, continuing to think of the faith as a self-evident presupposition for life in society.” This is a basic responsibility of the believer, that our human interactions in friendship, arts, politics, sports, school, work, and all loci in our culture, are to be infused with our orientation to Christ and to the Gospel. I don’t think any serious Christian would disagree.

The Holy Father writes, “In reality, not only can this presupposition no longer be taken for granted, but it is often openly denied.” I’m not convinced that this presupposition could ever be taken for granted, at least not outside committed religious communities. And from the viewpoint of a lay person who has been very critical of the hierarchy, I think we’ve had periods of time in which the curia and Rome have been steeped in scandal. The blundering of administering sex predators is so widespread in the Church that it touches upon church administration in other matters. I don’t think the laity, either liberals or conservatives, presume a lived-out faith among some members of the hierarchy. Some of this breaks along ideological lines. But some of it is “bipartisan” in the sense of the outrage over the grave errors in reassigning sex predators.

I would agree with Pope Benedict’s assessment that we cannot perceive a “unitary cultural matrix.” It might be said we never really could. Perhaps some element of church governance rely on that “unitariness”–some might say uniformity. Perhaps that time is gone and never to return. We shouldn’t then waste energy trying to reimpose or recover some golden memory of uniformity. We can instead take advantage of the opportunities of engaging human culture in all its richness. And be prepared for anything.

What I need to hear more from the institution is a frank admission of their culpability in the crisis of faith confronting not only Catholicism, but other Christian traditions. If there is a crisis of faith, or as  I hear often, a sense of sin adrift, then its time for pope and bishops to man up, and to demonstrate by example–not preaching–the optimal approach to recovering a sense of sin, contrition, and remedy.

Your thoughts?

 

Porta Fidei 1: The Door of Faith

Before much more of the Year of Faith proceeds, it may be worthwhile to look at Pope Benedict’s document from last Fall declaring the observance. Possibly it gives us an opportunity to review the Holy Father’s intent and to assess initiatives large and small.

Porta Fidei was issued on 11 October 2011. It is an apostolic letter, not the highest form of papal authority. But PF is an important document to consider.

The first section of these Church documents is often buttressed with citations of Scripture and offers a pep talk to believers, setting the tone in a positive way:

1. The “door of faith” (Acts 14:27) is always open for us, ushering us into the life of communion with God and offering entry into his Church. It is possible to cross that threshold when the word of God is proclaimed and the heart allows itself to be shaped by transforming grace. To enter through that door is to set out on a journey that lasts a lifetime. It begins with baptism (cf. Rom 6:4), through which we can address God as Father, and it ends with the passage through death to eternal life, fruit of the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, whose will it was, by the gift of the Holy Spirit, to draw those who believe in him into his own glory (cf. Jn 17:22). To profess faith in the Trinity – Father, Son and Holy Spirit – is to believe in one God who is Love (cf. 1 Jn 4:8): the Father, who in the fullness of time sent his Son for our salvation; Jesus Christ, who in the mystery of his death and resurrection redeemed the world; the Holy Spirit, who leads the Church across the centuries as we await the Lord’s glorious return.

The door is a great metaphor. If we are observant, it is one we relive every time we enter a church. Note the proclamation of the Word that precedes our (first) entry. I’m heartened that the Holy Father does not present the reception of transforming grace as a submission of the mind. It is much deeper than a willful assent to church teaching.

What do you readers see in this first section?

 

 

Next at the Plate for the Year of Faith?

One request from way back in July was to look at evangelization as a continuation of this site’s observance of The Year of Faith. I suppose a peek at the documents going in and coming out of last month’s synod is a thought. I think that Pope Benedict will be writing up a serious summary of the input, plus his reflections. I will be posting now and then on evangelization methods and experiences from our campus parish.

Otherwise, any suggestions?

 

Evangelii Nuntiandi 81-82: Final Thoughts

1975 was a holy year dedicated to reconciliation, hence, this connection:

81. This then, brothers and sons and daughters, is our heartfelt plea. It echoes the voice of our brethren assembled for the Third General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops. This is the task we have wished to give you at the close of a Holy Year which has enabled us to see better than ever the needs and the appeals of a multitude of brethren, both Christians and non-Christians, who await from the Church the Word of salvation.

May the light of the Holy Year, which has shone in the local Churches and in Rome for millions of consciences reconciled with God, continue to shine in the same way after the Jubilee through a program of pastoral action with evangelization as its basic feature, for these years which mark the eve of a new century, the eve also of the third millennium of Christianity.

A final dedication:

82. This is the desire that we rejoice to entrust to the hands and the heart of the Immaculate Blessed Virgin Mary, on this day which is especially consecrated to her and which is also the tenth anniversary of the close of the Second Vatican Council. On the morning of Pentecost she watched over with her prayer the beginning of evangelization prompted by the Holy Spirit: may she be the Star of the evangelization ever renewed which the Church, docile to her Lord’s command, must promote and accomplish, especially in these times which are difficult but full of hope!

In the name of Christ we bless you, your communities, your families, all those who are dear to you, in the words which Paul addressed to the Philippians: “I give thanks to my God every time I think of you- which is constantly, in every prayer I utter- rejoicing, as I plead on your behalf, at the way you have all continually helped to promote the gospel…. I hold all of you dear- you who…are sharers of my gracious lot…to defend the solid grounds on which the gospel rests. God himself can testify how much I long for each of you with the affection of Christ Jesus!”[Phil 1:3-4, 7-8.]

So, what do you think? A different kind of document from the style of John Paul II and Benedict XVI–more rambling and at times, more optimistic. Concerns and cautions, too, a decade out from Vatican II. A sign of a Church not quite at ease with the momentous changes within and outside its walls. But here at least, it was aware of the importance and challenges of evangelization. Care to share any impressions from the whole of the document?

 

Evangelii Nuntiandi 80: Obstacles

We Catholics have the message. But do we have the ability to overcome the obstacles we ourselves place in front of the Gospel?

80. Our appeal here is inspired by the fervor of the greatest preachers and evangelizers, whose lives were devoted to the apostolate. Among these we are glad to point out those whom we have proposed to the veneration of the faithful during the course of the Holy Year. They have known how to overcome many obstacles to evangelization.

Such obstacles are also present today, and we shall limit ourself to mentioning the lack of fervor. It is all the more serious because it comes from within. It is manifested in fatigue, disenchantment, compromise, lack of interest and above all lack of joy and hope. We exhort all those who have the task of evangelizing, by whatever title and at whatever level, always to nourish spiritual fervor[Cf. Rom 12:11]

And how do we nourish this fervor? One obvious key is respect for the various gifts and offices that have a role. In my experience, clergy are often weak in this. Many lay ecclesial ministers serve with a lack of respect and regard–and that doesn’t even begin to touch the ordinary parishioners who, after all, are in the front lines of evangelization in the world.

This fervor demands first of all that we should know how to put aside the excuses which would impede evangelization. The most insidious of these excuses are certainly the ones which people claim to find support for in such and such a teaching of the Council.

Thus one too frequently hears it said, in various terms, that to impose a truth, be it that of the Gospel, or to impose a way, be it that of salvation, cannot but be a violation of religious liberty. Besides, it is added, why proclaim the Gospel when the whole world is saved by uprightness of heart? We know likewise that the world and history are filled with “seeds of the Word”; is it not therefore an illusion to claim to bring the Gospel where it already exists in the seeds that the Lord Himself has sown?

I think people misunderstand the means of presenting the Gospel. They might assume that because they are good teachers, then teaching is essential in all their evangelical efforts. It is not. Suppose a person, even a bishop, can only teach and do it well. If a situation calls for the cultivation of trust and the seeker is disinclined to be taught, then the teacher needs to be silent, and permit other gifts to be utilized. One of the Church’s biggest self-obstacles is a dogmatic approach to gifts. If a gift worked in one instance, it will work in all or many.

Anyone who takes the trouble to study in the Council’s documents the questions upon which these excuses draw too superficially will find quite a different view.

So what do we do? We simply provide ourselves as a living example.

It would certainly be an error to impose something on the consciences of our brethren. But to propose to their consciences the truth of the Gospel and salvation in Jesus Christ, with complete clarity and with a total respect for the free options which it presents- “without coercion, or dishonorable or unworthy pressure”[Dignitaties Humanae 4]- far from being an attack on religious liberty is fully to respect that liberty, which is offered the choice of a way that even non-believers consider noble and uplifting. Is it then a crime against others’ freedom to proclaim with joy a Good News which one has come to know through the Lord’s mercy?[Dignitaties Humanae, 9-14] And why should only falsehood and error, debasement and pornography have the right to be put before people and often unfortunately imposed on them by the destructive propaganda of the mass media, by the tolerance of legislation, the timidity of the good and the impudence of the wicked? The respectful presentation of Christ and His kingdom is more than the evangelizer’s right; it is (a) duty. It is likewise the right of (our) fellow (human beings) to receive from (believers) the proclamation of the Good News of salvation. God can accomplish this salvation in whomsoever He wishes by ways which He alone knows.[Ad Gentes 7] And yet, if His Son came, it was precisely in order to reveal to us, by His word and by His life, the ordinary paths of salvation. And He has commanded us to transmit this revelation to others with His own authority. It would be useful if every Christian and every evangelizer were to pray about the following thought: (people) can gain salvation also in other ways, by God’s mercy, even though we do not preach the Gospel to them; but as for us, can we gain salvation if through negligence or fear or shame- what St. Paul called “blushing for the Gospel”[Cf. Rom 1:16] – or as a result of false ideas we fail to preach it? For that would be to betray the call of God, who wishes the seed to bear fruit through the voice of the ministers of the Gospel; and it will depend on us whether this grows into trees and produces its full fruit.

Let us therefore preserve our fervor of spirit. Let us preserve the delightful and comforting joy of evangelizing, even when it is in tears that we must sow. May it mean for us- as it did for John the Baptist, for Peter and Paul, for the other apostles and for a multitude of splendid evangelizers all through the Church’s history- an interior enthusiasm that nobody and nothing can quench. May it be the great joy of our consecrated lives. And may the world of our time, which is searching, sometimes with anguish, sometimes with hope, be enabled to receive the Good News not from evangelizers who are dejected, discouraged, impatient or anxious, but from ministers of the Gospel whose lives glow with fervor, who have first received the joy of Christ, and who are willing to risk their lives so that the kingdom may be proclaimed and the Church established in the midst of the world.

I think if we asked different people: pope, bishops, clergy, religious, lay ministers, parishioners, neophytes–we would find many different answers to the question of what obstacles we ourselves place in the way of the Gospel. Pope Paul’s input here is worthy of consideration. But it is not the whole picture. And it is not the reality everywhere in local circumstances.

Your thoughts?

 

Evangelii Nuntiandi 79: Signs of Love

I think we can ask a fair question. Do people serve the Church for the sake of loving others as Christ did, or is the primary motivation their personal salvation? Pope Paul’s emphasis on love is not faddish. He has the apostle Paul on his side:

79. The work of evangelization presupposes in the evangelizer(s) an ever increasing love for those whom (they are) evangelizing. That model evangelizer, the Apostle Paul, wrote these words to the Thessalonians, and they are a program for us all: “With such yearning love we chose to impart to you not only the gospel of God but our very selves, so dear had you become to us.”[1 Thess 2:8; cf. Phil 1:8] What is this love? It is much more than that of a teacher; it is the love of a father; and again, it is the love of a mother.[Cf. 1 Thess 2:7-11; 1 Cor 4:15; Gal 4:19] It is this love that the Lord expects from every preacher of the Gospel, from every builder of the Church. A sign of love will be the concern to give the truth and to bring people into unity. Another sign of love will be a devotion to the proclamation of Jesus Christ, without reservation or turning back. Let us add some other signs of this love.

The first is respect for the religious and spiritual situation of those being evangelized. Respect for their tempo and pace; no one has the right to force them excessively. Respect for their conscience and convictions, which are not to be treated in a harsh manner.

Another sign of this love is concern not to wound the other person, especially if he or she is weak in faith,[Cf. 1 Cor 8:9-13; Rom 14:15] with statements that may be clear for those who are already initiated but which for the faithful can be a source of bewilderment and scandal, like a wound in the soul.

Yet another sign of love will be the effort to transmit to Christians not doubts and uncertainties born of an erudition poorly assimilated but certainties that are solid because they are anchored in the Word of God. The faithful need these certainties for their Christian life; they have a right to them, as children of God who abandon themselves entirely into His arms and to the exigencies of love.

These are difficult balances for anyone. Any minister must know when to push, and when to back off. One doesn’t look within to ponder, “I’ve been rather easy-going lately. I need to balance my approach so they will take me seriously.” I’ve heard people do this. I’ve fallen into the trap as a parent and as a minister. How does one assess not wounding another person? By knowing them. Knowing them as a friend and companion. A person who cannot or will not do this will never be fruitful as an evangelizer.

What are you readers seeing in this section? Only a few more posts to go in this series. Speak up, if you wish.

 

 

Evangelii Nuntiandi 78: Faithfulness to the Truth

The Christian believes that the Gospel provides for human liberation, peace, and a fulfillment of our destiny. This is an optimistic message as head to the concluding sections of Evangelii Nuntiandi, but they also place on all believers an important responsibility:

78. The Gospel entrusted to us is also the word of truth. A truth which liberates[Cf. Jn 8:32] and which alone gives peace of heart is what people are looking for when we proclaim the Good News to them. The truth about God, about (humankind) and (our) mysterious destiny, about the world; the difficult truth that we seek in the Word of God and of which, we repeat, we are neither the masters nor the owners, but the depositaries, the heralds and the servants.

We should temper expectations of ourselves by this news. Certainly, all believers should take their role as heralds and servants seriously. But … God is ultimately responsible. We do our best. Grace makes up the difference.

Every evangelizer is expected to have a reverence for truth, especially since the truth that (she or) he studies and communicates is none other than revealed truth and hence, more than any other, a sharing in the first truth which is God Himself. The preacher of the Gospel will therefore be a person who even at the price of personal renunciation and suffering always seeks the truth that (she or) he must transmit to others. (They) never betray or hide truth out of a desire to please (others), in order to astonish or to shock, nor for the sake of originality or a desire to make an impression. (They) do not refuse truth. (They) do not obscure revealed truth by being too idle to search for it, or for the sake of (their) own comfort, or out of fear. (They) do not neglect to study it. (They) serve it generously, without making it serve (the evangelizer).

Part of doing our best means preparing our humility (not being people-pleasers), our egos (not impressing others), our will (not refusing the truth), our courage (no fear), our minds (attending to study), and our hearts (serving others, not ourselves).

Individual affirmations for clergy:

We are the pastors of the faithful people, and our pastoral service impels us to preserve, defend, and to communicate the truth regardless of the sacrifices that this involves. So many eminent and holy pastors have left us the example of this love of truth. In many cases it was an heroic love. The God of truth expects us to be the vigilant defenders and devoted preachers of truth.

… for theologians:

(People) of learning- whether you be theologians, exegetes or historians- the work of evangelization needs your tireless work of research, and also care and tact in transmitting the truth to which your studies lead you but which is always greater than the heart of (a person), being the very truth of God.

… and for those who work with youth:

Parents and teachers, your task- and the many conflicts of the present day do not make it an easy one- is to help your children and your students to discover truth, including religious and spiritual truth.

 

Evangelii Nuntiandi 77: Christian Division

Is this timely or what?

77. The power of evangelization will find itself considerably diminished if those who proclaim the Gospel are divided among themselves in all sorts of ways. Is this not perhaps one of the great sicknesses of evangelization today? Indeed, if the Gospel that we proclaim is seen to be rent by doctrinal disputes, ideological polarizations or mutual condemnations among Christians, at the mercy of the latter’s differing views on Christ and the Church and even because of their different concepts of society and human institutions, how can those to whom we address our preaching fail to be disturbed, disoriented, even scandalized?

The Lord’s spiritual testament tells us that unity among His followers is not only the proof that we are His but also the proof that He is sent by the Father. It is the test of the credibility of Christians and of Christ Himself. As evangelizers, we must offer Christ’s faithful not the image of people divided and separated by unedifying quarrels, but the image of people who are mature in faith and capable of finding a meeting-point beyond the real tensions, thanks to a shared, sincere and disinterested search for truth. Yes, the destiny of evangelization is certainly bound up with the witness of unity given by the Church. This is a source of responsibility and also of comfort.

At this point we wish to emphasize the sign of unity among all Christians as the way and instrument of evangelization. The division among Christians is a serious reality which impedes the very work of Christ. The Second Vatican Council states clearly and emphatically that this division “damages the most holy cause of preaching the Gospel to all (people), and it impedes many from embracing the faith.”[Ad Gentes 6; Unitatis Redintegratio 1] For this reason, in proclaiming the Holy Year we considered it necessary to recall to all the faithful of the Catholic world that “before all (people) can be brought together and restored to the grace of God our Father, communion must be reestablished between those who by faith have acknowledged and accepted Jesus Christ as the Lord of mercy who sets (people) free and unites them in the Spirit of love and truth.”[Bull Apostolorum Limina, VII: AAS 66 (1974), p. 305]

And it is with a strong feeling of Christian hope that look to the efforts being made in the Christian world for this restoration of the full unity willed by Christ. St. Paul assures us that “hope does not disappoint us.”[Rom 5:5] While we still work to obtain full unity from the Lord, we wish to see prayer intensified. Moreover we make our own the desire of the Fathers of the Third General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, for a collaboration marked by greater commitment with the Christian brethren with whom we are not yet united in perfect unity, taking as a basis the foundation of Baptism and the patrimony of faith which is common to us. By doing this we can already give a greater common witness to Christ before the world in the very work of evangelization. Christ’s command urges us to do this; the duty of preaching and of giving witness to the Gospel requires this.

While Pope Paul was speaking of a lack of harmony between Christian traditions, what we writes seems very apt for the divisions within the Roman Catholic Church today. One challenge is the segregation of interests. Not only do Christian groups worship separately from one another, but within the Roman tradition, there has grown a clear splintering of parts. Bishops chum with bishops. Priests with their own. Deacons have their groups. Lay ministers. Lay people with different ideologies fall together online. What we miss is priests fostering true relationships with parishioners. Bishops with their diocesan clergy. Conservative and liberal Catholics coming together to address real life parish issues.

In this climate, is it any wonder the witness of Christianity to non-believers can be laughable?

 

Evangelii Nuntiandi 76: The Church Self-Examines

We look at ourselves, the Church, and we discern important questions:

76. Let us now consider the very persons of the evangelizers.

It is often said nowadays that the present century thirsts for authenticity. Especially in regard to young people it is said that they have a horror of the artificial or false and that they are searching above all for truth and honesty.

These “signs of the times” should find us vigilant. Either tacitly or aloud- but always forcefully- we are being asked: Do you really believe what you are proclaiming? Do you live what you believe? Do you really preach what you live? The witness of life has become more than ever an essential condition for real effectiveness in preaching. Precisely because of this we are, to a certain extent, responsible for the progress of the Gospel that we proclaim.

Yes, bishops, clergy, and lay people are responsible, whether or not they’ve taken to heart the ordination admonition cited above. I would say that if anything, the distrust of authority is even more profound today. Charismatic leaders ply us, appealing to emotions. And when they disappoint, as they inevitably do, much is lost.

And so we ask questions of ourselves. Is our witness an extraordinary one?

“What is the state of the Church ten years after the Council?” we asked at the beginning of this meditation. Is she firmly established in the midst of the world and yet free and independent enough to call for the world’s attention? Does she testify to solidarity with people and at the same time to the divine Absolute? Is she more ardent in contemplation and adoration and more zealous in missionary, charitable and liberating action? Is she ever more committed to the effort to search for the restoration of the complete unity of Christians, a unity that makes more effective the common witness, “so that the world may believe”[Jn 17:21] We are all responsible for the answers that could be given to these questions.

The Eucharist makes the Church, and therefore, evangelization:

We therefore address our exhortation to our brethren in the Episcopate, placed by the Holy Spirit to govern the Church.[Cf. Acts 20:28] We exhort the priests and deacons, the bishops’ collaborators in assembling the People of God and in animating spiritually the local communities. We exhort the religious, witnesses of a Church called to holiness and hence themselves invited to a life that bears testimony to the beatitudes of the Gospel. We exhort the laity: Christian families, youth, adults, all those who exercise a trade or profession, leaders, without forgetting the poor who are often rich in faith and hope- all lay people who are conscious of their evangelizing role in the service of their Church or in the midst of society and the world. We say to all of them: our evangelizing zeal must spring from true holiness of life, and, as the Second Vatican Council suggests, preaching must in its turn make the preacher grow in holiness, which is nourished by prayer and above all by love for the Eucharist.[Presbyterorum Ordinis 13]

A needful reminder for the pessimists in our midst:

The world which, paradoxically, despite innumerable signs of the denial of God, is nevertheless searching for Him in unexpected ways and painfully experiencing the need of Him- the world is calling for evangelizers to speak to it of a God whom the evangelists themselves should know and be familiar with as if they could see the invisible.[Cf. Heb 11:27] The world calls for and expects from us simplicity of life, the spirit of prayer, charity towards all, especially towards the lowly and the poor, obedience and humility, detachment and self-sacrifice. Without this mark of holiness, our word will have difficulty in touching the heart of modern man. It risks being vain and sterile.

Why do we presume the best of the world? Because it is only when non-believers are disposed to God are they likely to hear the divine voice and respond to the invitation. The current strain of adversarial engagement is not only a sign of narcissism, but it is a ultimately self-defeating example of the antigospel.

 

Evangelii Nuntiandi 75: The Role of the Holy Spirit

It should be obvious, but we can’t evangelize the world without a lot of outside help:

75. Evangelization will never be possible without the action of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit descends on Jesus of Nazareth at the moment of His baptism when the voice of the Father- “This is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased”[Mt. 3:17]- manifests in an external way the election of Jesus and His mission. Jesus is “led by the Spirit” to experience in the desert the decisive combat and the supreme test before beginning this mission.[Mt. 4:1] It is “in the power of the Spirit”[Lk 4:14] that He returns to Galilee and begins His preaching at Nazareth, applying to Himself the passage of Isaiah: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me.” And He proclaims: “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled.”[Lk 4:18], 21; cf. Is 61:1] To the disciples whom He was about to send forth He says, breathing on them, “Receive the Holy Spirit.”[Jn 20:22]

Our biblical tradition suggests that the Passion, Death, and Resurrection was not enough to get the early disciples moving:

In fact, it is only after the coming of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost that the apostles depart to all the ends of the earth in order to begin the great work of the Church’s evangelization. Peter explains this event as the fulfillment of the prophecy of Joel: “I will pour out my spirit.”[Acts 2:17] Peter is filled with the Holy Spirit so that he can speak to the people about Jesus, the Son of God.[Cf. Acts 4:8] Paul too is filled with the Holy Spirit[Cf. Acts 9:17] before dedicating himself to his apostolic ministry, as is Stephen when he is chosen for the ministry of service and later on for the witness of blood.[Cf. Acts 6:5, 10; 7:55] The Spirit, who causes Peter, Paul and the Twelve to speak, and who inspires the words that they are to utter, also comes down “on those who heard the word.”[Acts 10:44]

The Spirit is active in both evangelizer and seeker:

It is in the “consolation of the Holy Spirit” that the Church increases.[Acts 9:31] The Holy Spirit is the soul of the Church. It is He who explains to the faithful the deep meaning of the teaching of Jesus and of His mystery. It is the Holy Spirit who, today just as at the beginning of the Church, acts in every evangelizer who allows (herself or) himself to be possessed and led by Him. The Holy Spirit places on (her or) his lips the words which (they) could not find by (themselves), and at the same time the Holy Spirit predisposes the soul of the hearer to be open and receptive to the Good News and to the kingdom being proclaimed.

Human skill, even the highest realization of communication effectiveness is not quite up to par with the agency of God’s grace through the Holy Spirit:

Techniques of evangelization are good, but even the most advanced ones could not replace the gentle action of the Spirit. The most perfect preparation of the evangelizer has no effect without the Holy Spirit. Without the Holy Spirit the most convincing dialectic has no power over the heart of man. Without Him the most highly developed schemas resting on a sociological or psychological basis are quickly seen to be quite valueless.

An optimism about the world one would not be reading or hearing from a pope today, I think:

We live in the Church at a privileged moment of the Spirit. Everywhere people are trying to know Him better, as the Scripture reveals Him. They are happy to place themselves under His inspiration. They are gathering about Him; they want to let themselves be led by Him. Now if the Spirit of God has a preeminent place in the whole life of the Church, it is in her evangelizing mission that He is most active. It is not by chance that the great inauguration of evangelization took place on the morning of Pentecost, under the inspiration of the Spirit.

I think this is true about people today. I think many are searching, seeking, and longing. They want a leader. They want a way of life that has meaning.

It must be said that the Holy Spirit is the principal agent of evangelization: it is He who impels each individual to proclaim the Gospel, and it is He who in the depths of consciences causes the word of salvation to be accepted and understood.[Ad Gentes 4] But it can equally be said that He is the goal of evangelization: He alone stirs up the new creation, the new humanity of which evangelization is to be the result, with that unity in variety which evangelization wishes to achieve within the Christian community. Through the Holy Spirit the Gospel penetrates to the heart of the world, for it is He who causes people to discern the signs of the times- signs willed by God- which evangelization reveals and puts to use within history.

It is essential that we be open to this. Prayer is certainly implied here: every believer asks the Holy Spirit for divine grace and for a fruitfulness of the Church. In this final paragraph of EN 75, “study” is urged. And yes, I think we should study. Bishops and priests themselves need to give better witness and themselves study and be seen studying–it’s only a good example. But I also think that Pope Paul missed a vital piece. Even without reading below, my friends can probably guess what I’ll suggest.

The Bishops’ Synod of 1974, which insisted strongly on the place of the Holy Spirit in evangelization, also expressed the desire that pastors and theologians- and we would also say the faithful marked by the seal of the Spirit by Baptism- should study more thoroughly the nature and manner of the Holy Spirit’s action in evangelization today. This is our desire too, and we exhort all evangelizers, whoever they may be, to pray without ceasing to the Holy Spirit with faith and fervor and to let themselves prudently be guided by Him as the decisive inspirer of their plans, their initiatives and their evangelizing activity.

Discernment.

We have the message, the tools to deliver it, and a people to whom we bring it. But we also need discernment, an awareness of God’s subtle nudge to speak up when the moment is upon us, to shush when we’re too tired or angry or stupid, to use this or that tool to better effect when we have a choice. I think an evangelical believer must pray for seekers, and earnestly desire their relationship with God. And we must pray to overcome our own worst impulses. We can desire to be so effective in cooperating with the Holy Spirit that every seeker we encounter will surpass us in knowledge of God, love for God, and fruitfulness in gaining even more believers and disciples.

What do you think?