BENEDICT XVI: NEWS, PAPAL TEXTS, PHOTOS AND COMMENTARY

New evangelization:
Not an abstract formula
but a strong idea
by Salvatore Fisichella
Titular Archbishop of Voghenza
President of the Pontifical Council
for the Promotion of New Evangelization
Translated from the 10/13/10 issue of




Mons. Fisichella, with Fr. Federico Lomardi, Vatican press director, at the news conference on Tuesday to present the Pope's motu proprio creating the Pontifical Council for Promoting New Evangelization.


One of the specific characteristics of Christianity is its concept of being profoundly 'set' within history. The words of Jesus to his disciples when he reminds them that they are in the world but that they are not of the world (cfr Jn 15,19); 17,13-14) have been interpreted as a fundamental commitment to share im the events of history, knowing that the ultimate objective that will give a full meaning to events goes beyond history itself.

Precisely in this regard, it is possible to highlight one of the best-known teachings from the Second Vatican Counci, which had forcefully underscored the concept of the history of salvation.

This premise allows us to reflect on the Apostolic Letter Ubicumque et semper, with which Pope Benedict XVI has instituted the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of New Evangelization.

First of all, we are grateful to Benedict XVI for this profoundly prophetic intuition, which has been able to look realistically at the present situation of the Chrch in order to plan for it a journey that will demand much of her in the near future.

We live in a time of great challenges which will considerably affect the behavior of entre generations, because an era has ended and we hav entered a new phase in the story of mankind.

To the many positive elements which allow us to see a more consistent commmitment to a life of faith - also due to a more profound knowledge of its content - there often correspond forms of 'deatchment from faith' as the consequence of widespread religious indifference, prelude to de facto atheism.

Often, lack of knowledge of the basic content of the faith brings the Catholic inevitably to assume behaviors and forms of moral judgment that are often contrary to the essense of the faith itself as it has always been announced and lived in the course of its history of 20 centuries.

Relativism, whose limitationss and contradictions Pope Benedict has always denounced, precisely in the light of correct anthropology [knowledge of man], has emerged as the characteristic feature of these decades that have been increasingly marked by the consequences of a a secularism bent on distancing contemporary man from his fundamental relationship with God.

In this sense, it is above all the Churches with ancient traditions who are faced with this condition, even if in the process of globalization that has engulfed us all, no one seems able to escape this tragic situation, which, to use words from the Apostolic Letter, creates an 'interior desert', alienating man from himself.

To the secularist principle of living in the world etsi Deus non daretur - as if God does not exist - then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger opposed the principle of living in the world veluti si Deus daretur - as if God exists.

This is one of the reasons that led Benedict XVI to create a dicastery with the task of promoting a new evangelization.

As the title of the letter indicates, it is the mission that the Church, always and everywhere, has felt to be its fundamental task, in order to fully comply with the Lord's command to go forth into the world and make all the peoples of the earth into his disciples.

The idea of new evangelization has been the object of attentive reflection by the Magisterium of the Church in recent decades. It is obligatory to recall Paul VI's Evangelii nuntiandi, after the Synod on evangelization in 1974, the repeated and insistent interventions of John Paul II who introduced the expression 'new evangelization', and lastly, Benedict XVI, who has followed them by taking a concrete step with the institution of this new Pontifical Council.

Right away we can see that the objective is a great challenge to the whole Church to reflect upon and find adequate forms for renewing her own announcement of Christ to so many baptized persons who no longer have the sense of belonging to the Christian community and are victims of the subjectivism of our time, closed up in an individualism that is devoid of public and social responsibility.

The motu proprio, more directly, identifies the Churches with an ancient tradition which, although they have well-differentiated traditions and cultures, require a renewed missionary spirit that can make the necessary leap corresponding to the new exigencies of the contemporary historical situation.

In this sense, the task which awaits us is no different from what has always been the Church's task: to make known the true face of Christ, the one savior, who revealed the merciful love of the Father towards all without excluding anyone.

In the mystery of his Incarnation, he fulfilled the ancient promise of God, and in his death and resurrection, he sowed in the world the seed of the hope that does not disappoint because it responds to the most intimate questions of every man who seeks a meaning to life, a response that is not based on fleeting hypotheses of the moment, but on the certainty that comes from faith.

Thus, the Church is called on to reinvigorate herself in what is her most essential task - missionary announcement. It can do this effectively to the degree that she is able to transmit the Word of God in a vibrant way from generation to generation, allowing everyone to have the true experience of ecclesial life, the foundation for a genuine response of faith.

As Ubicunque et semper says, the new evangelization is not a uniform formula for all circumstances. First of all, there is no magic formula. It requires so much more: a commitment, in fact, to develop strong ideas that can sustain corresponding pastoral activity.

Moreover, it must be able to carefully check out the different objectives and traditions that these ancient churches have by virtue of so many centuries of history. It is a plurality of forms that does not undermine unity but makes it more articulated and provides us with efficient means to approach our contemporaries.

A word about the competencies of the new dicastery may help to better understand its objectives and the work which it will be called on to do.

We must avoid, above all, that the term 'new evangelization' sound like an abstract formula. We must fill it with theological and pastoral content and reinforce it with the Magisterium of the past few decades.

A first systematization of this teaching will show our continuing attention to the problem, and the wealth of approaches that are possible.

Alongside this, we must consider the many initiatives which, in the past several years, individual bishops and their respective local churches, bishops' conferences, and associations of lay faithful have taken themselves, out of their consciousness of the need for new evangelization. Knowledge of these precious initiatives and coordinating them could be a a very useful first step for the dicastery.

2012 will be the 20th anniversary of the publication of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. Among the competencies that have been entrusted to the new dicastery, 'promoting' the use of the Catechism will be decisive.

In fact, the Catechism is one of the most mature fruits of Vatican-II - it gathers together organically the entire patrimony of Catholic doctrine as it developed, and represents the most complete instrument for transmitting the faith, as it is conftonted with the constant changes and questions that the world poses to believers.

Finally, to find all the forms that progress in the science of communications has achieved to use as positive instruments in the service of the new evangelization is a task that will necessarily engage the dicastery - given the decisive role that communications media have as vehicles for the present culture and mentality.

We live in history, and dates have a meaning. The new dicastery has carefully considered some dates which directly concern it for the symbolic value they possess.

The Pope announced his intention to institute this Pontifical Council during the Solemn Vespers before the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul, the pillars of the Church, who, through their announcement and martyrdom, became effective witnesses for Christ.

This Apostolic Letter which institutes the Council was signed on the feast of St. Matthew, apostle and evangelist.

These occasions lead us to reaffirm our loyalty to the Successor of Peter and the commitment that we must make to making the Gospel a means of salvation for contemporary men.

The Gospel is not a myth, but the living testimonial of a historical event that changed the face of history. The new evangelization should make known, first of all, the historical figure of Jesus and his teaching just as it has been faithfully transmitted from the original communities, and which finds normative codification in the Gospels and other writings of the New Testament.

Finally, today the Vatican observes the liturgical feast of Mary, Mother of the Church. It is not without some trepidation that we entrust to her, the star of evangelization, the great mission that the Pope has entrusted to us, so that we can sustain the work of the Church in her constant announcement of the Gospel to every person we meet along the way.