Franciscan at Home

In this issue we complete our introduction to John Paul II’s prophetic document on the Gospel of Life.

One of the most important initiatives of Pope John Paul II was his call for a ‘new evangelization’—a rekindling of the primary mission of the Church to proclaim, by word and deed, the Good News of Jesus Christ to all people. This would include the proclamation of the Gospel to those peoples and cultures which had received the Gospel in the past, but have ‘fallen away,’ (hence the need for ‘re-evangelization’).

In the final chapter of Evangelium Vitae, Pope John Paul reminds us of the Church’s identity as ‘the people of life and for life… because God, in his unconditional love, has given us the Gospel of life’ (78.3; 79.1). I am reminded of powerful words in the Gospel of John in which Jesus contrasts the thief ‘who comes only to steal and kill and destroy’ with himself, the Good Shepherd who said, ‘I came that they may have life and have it abundantly’ (Jn 10:10). Most of this encyclical has focused on the monumental struggle between the ‘culture of death,’ which like the thief ‘comes only to steal and kill and destroy’, and the mission of Jesus and the Church to bring and protect life. This final section focuses on the positive mission of the Church to promote a ‘new culture of human life’.

Eric Westby offers sound, practical advice for ways in which we can evangelize in our catechetical work.

I know I am not the only catechist who has prepared what I thought was the greatest catechetical session since the Sermon on the Mount, only to have it help the participants cure their most recent battles with insomnia. Over the years, as I have seen little impact from what I thought were well-planned sessions, it has forced me to look more closely at the process of conversion, specifically that which we do to prepare a person to hear the Good News. In Catechesi Tradendae 20, Pope John Paul II describes catechesis as a maturation of the process of evangelization. As a catechist, the better I assisted in the process of evangelization (the better I helped a person know, love and follow the Lord Jesus) the easier it became to catechize that person. In this article, I would like to offer practical ways we can evangelize in our catechetical endeavors, and in doing so, prepare the foundation for catechesis and lifelong conversion.

In this article, Bishop Blair looks at the role of the Holy Spirit and prayer in Evangelization and Catechesis.

In 2009, catechetical leaders in the United States will celebrate the 10th anniversary of the publishing of Our Hearts Were Burning Within Us: A Pastoral Plan for Adult Faith Formation, issued by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. In this article, Bishop Blair highlights and reflects upon the document’s emphasis on prayer, especially to the Holy Spirit.

The Pastoral Plan for Adult Faith Formation, Our Hearts Were Burning Within Us, states that adult Catholics ‘must be women and men of prayer’ if they are to address the widespread spiritual hunger that characterizes society today. ‘Deepening personal prayer’ is acknowledged as a significant means to achieving the first of three major goals in the pastoral plan, that is, to ‘Invite and Enable Ongoing Conversion to Jesus in Holiness of Life’. Prayer is also presented as the fourth of six dimensions of a living, explicit and fruitful Christian faith.

I would like to offer some reflections on prayer, specifically on prayer in relation to the Holy Spirit, as an essential spiritual requirement for the fruitfulness of any pastoral plan, including adult faith formation.

Points for Catechists

Amette Ley examines the helpful analysis and clarifications provided by the "Doctrinal Note on Some Aspects of Evangelisation," published by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, December 2007.

We can be held back in our work by a concern that the proclamation of the Gospel is intrusive or limiting of others’ personal freedom. How do we balance the missionary command of the Lord with respect for the conscience and religious freedom of all people?

This negative understanding of evangelisation has been a powerful undercurrent recently, resulting in an unwillingness to proclaim the truth about Christ at all outside our own closed circles. In positively reformulating the idea that there is no salvation outside the Church, many people have sometimes implied the incorrect view that the Church is no longer necessary for salvation – or even that belief in Christ is no longer necessary.

In the light of this misunderstanding, we have been given recently a Doctrinal Note on Some Aspects of Evangelisation – a document which is honest about the difficulties involved and clear about the task to be done, and which can be of great help to us.

This year we are focussing on God the Father. It is a time to consider origins and goals since the Eternal Father is, of course, both. He is the source of human life and He is its only and unimaginable goal. The whole of life is encompassed by His watchful providence as He leads us from Himself to Himself.

Catechesis necessarily takes its orientation from these fundamental truths, and we can think of catechesis as our gradual induction into these most basic points about our life. It is easy to see why the Church gives such prominence to the role of catechesis: what more important work in the Church can there be than that of bringing people to a realisation of these marvellous truths?

Matthew concludes his Gospel with Jesus commanding his apostles in these words, “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” (28:19-20). This command, which later became known as the Great Commission, comprises the main mission of the Church (see Evangelii Nuntiandi 14). It is for this mission that the Holy Spirit is poured upon the disciples gathered in the upper room on Pentecost morning. Strengthened by the Holy Spirit, the early Church fulfills Jesus’ Great Commission by proclaiming the Gospel, calling people to conversion, baptizing, and teaching. I would like to take some time to reflect more deeply on Christ’s call to “Go” – that is the initial evangelization activity of the Church.

Jesus’ mandate “constitutes the essential mission of the Church” both yesterday and today (EN 14). Reflecting on Jesus’ command, the General Directory for Catechesis states:

“Primary proclamation is addressed to non-believers and those living in religious indifference. Its functions are to proclaim the Gospel and to call to conversion.… Primary proclamation, which every Christian is called to perform, is part of that "Go" (183) which Jesus imposes on his disciples: it implies, therefore, a going-out, a haste, a message.” GDC 61

There are three fundamental aspects of Jesus’ commission that call for our attention if we are going to understand clearly what Jesus is asking of his disciples. These three include a going forth, a haste, and a message.

More than 500 years after the Gospel was first proclaimed in the New World, America again needs to hear the good news of Jesus Christ.

That Gospel is more than a philosophy of life. It’s a divine person—with a face and a name, and a heart that beats with the very love of God. So the purpose of our catechesis must always be to bring about an encounter with Jesus Christ—to help all our brothers and sisters come to know and love Jesus.

But how do we catechize a culture that has grown indifferent to religion, a society in which more and more people live as if God does not exist? Lately, I’ve come to believe that in our catechesis there is much we can learn from our country’s first evangelization.

During their meeting in November 2005, the French bishops voted for a National Guidelines Document for Catechesis in France and for Proposals for the Organization of Catechetical Action in France. Only the first document was presented for the approval of the Apostolic See and it obtained this approval in October 2006; it is with this that we are mainly concerned here. It is a document of general guidelines (cf. GDC 282), distinct from and complementary to the Catechism of the Catholic Church (to which it refers) and which presents ‘the fundamentals of catechetical practice’, i.e. the ‘methodological base from which the practical implementation of catechesis can be elaborated’. The Decree of the Congregation for the Clergy specifies that this document ‘without being normative, is published with the authority of the [French] bishops’.

The National Document is divided into three chapters. The first locates catechesis in the missionary Church by its nature. The second chapter stresses the importance of the model of Christian initiation for such a catechesis. The third chapter specifies the pedagogical consequences of this initiatory catechesis.