Pope calls for a ‘new dynamism’



 

 

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By Francis X Rocca in Vatican City

4 November, 2012
 

Winning converts to the Church, ministering better to practising Catholics and bringing lapsed members back into the fold are all parts of the multi-faceted effort known as the “new evangelisation”, Pope Benedict XVI told a group of bishops and other Church leaders on Sunday, 28 October. He was delivering his homily at a Mass marking the end of the world Synod of Bishops on the new evangelisation. The three-week gathering, which brought more than 260 bishops and religious superiors to the Vatican, along with dozens of official observers and experts, discussed how the Church can revive and spread the faith in increasingly secular societies. Pope Benedict underscored “three pastoral themes” that he said had emerged from the talks. “Ordinary pastoral ministry ... must be more animated by the fire of the Spirit, so as to inflame the hearts of the faithful,” he said, stressing the importance of the sacrament of confession, and the necessity of “appropriate catechesis” in preparation for the sacraments of baptism, confirmation and the Eucharist. The pope also called for a “new missionary dynamism” to “proclaim the message of salvation to those who do not yet know Jesus Christ”. “There are still many regions in Africa, Asia and Oceania whose inhabitants await with lively expectation, sometimes without being fully aware of it, the first proclamation of the Gospel,” he said. And as a result of migration driven by globalisation, he added, the “first proclamation is needed even in countries that were evangelised long ago”. The pope spoke also of the need to persuade lapsed Catholics, “especially in the most secular countries”, to “encounter Jesus Christ anew, rediscover the joy of faith and return to religious practice in the community of the faithful”. This effort, in particular, calls for “pastoral creativity” and use of a “new language attuned to the different world cultures”, he said. As an example of such innovation, the pope mentioned the Vatican’s “Courtyard of the Gentiles” project, which promotes dialogue between religious believers and agnostics. Referring to the day’s reading from the Gospel of St Mark, he invoked Bartimaeus – the blind man who miraculously received his sight back from Jesus and then joined him as one of the disciples – as a model for Christians in countries “where the light of faith has grown dim”. “New evangelisers are like that,” Pope Benedict said, “people who have had the experience of being healed by God, through Jesus Christ.” At the synod’s last working session, on 27 October, the pope thanked the participants for their work, including the final propositions that will eventually serve as the basis for a document of the pope’s own reflections on the new evangelisation. He said also he was making two administrative changes relevant to the new evangelisation. Responsibility for seminaries will shift from the Vatican Congregation for Catholic Education to the Congr­egation for the Clergy; and responsibility for catechesis will shift from the Congreg­ation for the Clergy to the Pontifical Council for Prom­oting New Evangelisation. The pope also congratulated the six bishops whom he will induct into the College of Cardinals on 24 November.

 

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Taken from: http://www.catholicweekly.com.au/article.php?classID=1&subclassID=3&articleID=11124&class=News&subclass=CW%20World