In need of a thrust

The image of a Church in Europe, which is experiencing “a situation similar to that of the Acts of the Apostles, immerged in a foreign culture” emerges from European Bishops’ Conferences’ answers collected in a CCEE questionnaire on the “New Evangelization”. The data was presented to the presidents of the Bishops’ Conferences gathered in plenary meeting in Tirana by Jean-Luc Moens, coordinator of City Missions in Europe. Msgr. Rino Fisichella, President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting the New Evangelization, commented the findings. The research. The questionnaire shows a great diversity between Countries. However, in their replies, the Bishops’ Conferences underlined that the “New Evangelization in Europe consists primarily in approaching those that have strayed from the Church and from the faith, and the baptized who have lost their Christian faith”. It is a question of helping Christians “to become evangelized Christians”. The bishops also expressed the need for Churches in Europe “to address the ongoing changes in society, the new culture that emerges, the growing secularization whereby religion, and notably Christianity, no longer has a place. Some – is stated in the final report – have noted something similar to a “deforestation of Christian memory”. In a similar context, the bishops acknowledged: “A new evangelization requires a new thrust, a renewed missionary zeal”. By missionary zeal is intended: “to restore the courage and the force of the first Christians to the present times”. “The lack of trust – remarks Jean-Luc Moens – is perhaps our greatest problem. Good will and potential aren’t lacking, but a thrust is needed so that Catholics, gradually increasing their trust, will be capable to affirm their identity. Wide-ranging challenges also emerged from the answers to the CCEE questionnaire. The first challenge is related to contemporary society, to a culture that increasingly perceives an “eclipse of God”. Another “general” challenge is linked to the Church. The “decrease in religious sentiment among Catholics” is reason for concern. This requires engaging in “a new dynamism” that must spring from Catholics themselves. Some view as a challenge also “the image that the Church gives of herself, sadly shaken by the paedophilia scandals. Contemporary Church needs the witness of saints”. The families are among the protagonists of the new evangelization. “They should be the first missionary place” – the bishops say. Conversely, owing to the crisis in the continent “the transmission of faith in the family is no longer taking place”. A European paradox. “Under many angles the situation is paradoxical. There is a detachment from Christian religion while the quest for sacred and religious elements is gaining new impetus. It is said that faith has no voice in private, public or social life. Nonetheless, we fill city squares with our public initiatives”, said Msgr. Rino Fisichella, President of the Pontifical Council for the New Evangelization, at the CCEE plenary meeting in Tirana. For Msgr. Fisichella, sadly, “personal existence develops regardless of the horizon of faith, which is confined to a private sphere, detached from interpersonal relations and from the social and civil aspects of life”. Religion, he explained, “is not being denied, rather, it is conceived with a well-delimitated role. It has a marginal voice when in comes to ethical judgement and in public behaviour”. In this context, “it is necessary that the new evangelization incorporates contents that will show that the enigma of personal existence is not solved by rejecting mystery but by choosing of being a part of it”. The importance of Christianity. Speaking of Europe Msgr. Fisichella highlighted the widespread intention “to build a Europe that is independent from Christianity, and in some cases, that is even against it”. But “Christianity is the sine qua non condition enabling a wholesome comprehension of the history and of the topical situation of our Countries”. Therefore, “it is not by marginalizing or exorcizing Christianity that we will create a better society”. The new evangelization “must enter this cultural context that shapes the mentality of generations of individuals” with “the task of producing a thought that will constitute the foundations for the development of an era that will pass on a culture marked by faith to the next generations, enabling them to live in genuine freedom as they are projected towards the truth”. “The new evangelization – said Msgr. Fisichella – is a chance that is offered us to read and interpret the current historical moment and to transform the ordinary activity of the Church into an extraordinary event”.