"Responding to the challenge of secularism", by "not disavowing" the Christian roots of Europe. This is the double appeal made today by the Pope to the Slovenian Bishops, whom he received in audience at the end of their visit "ad limina". "If Europe wants to remain and become increasingly a land of peace, retaining as one of its essential values the respect of the dignity of the human person began Benedict XVI , it cannot disavow the main spiritual and ethical component of such foundation, that is, the Christian component". The "main challenge which the Church in Slovenia has to face today", went on the Pontiff, "is a western type of secularism, which is different from and maybe more surreptitious than the Marxist one" and which "shows signs that cannot help worrying us". They include, according to the Pope, the "frenetic search for material goods", the "drop in the birth rate" and the "decrease in churchgoing, with a remarkable drop in callings to priesthood and consecrated life". Hence the Holy Father’s invitation to the Slovenian Church to "respond to this materialistic and selfish culture with a consistent evangelising action, starting from the parishes", because "it is from the parish communities, more than from any other structure, that initiatives and effective acts of Christian testimony can and must come".” ” ” “
