European bishops discuss new evangelization
July 03, 2013
Representatives of bishops’ conferences of 33 European nations gathered in Warsaw from June 27 to 30 to discuss the new evangelization and recall the tenth anniversary of Ecclesia in Europa, Blessed John Paul’s apostolic exhortation on the Church in Europe.
“In the last decade the world, Europe included, has suffered severe stress and sudden changes, which were not always desired, coherent, logical and credible,” the Council of European Bishops’ Conferences stated in a communiqué at the conclusion of the meeting. “The disorientation that many social and cultural changes have brought about in the last ten years are, at the same time, cause and effect of some phenomena related to attempts at unravelling the culture of the family and the common good in favor of a purely self-centered, hedonistic and consumerist vision of human life.”
“To outreach those who are baptized but do not live their faith any longer, not only the Church urges Christians to go to meet people in our streets, but at the same time she invites us to be docile when listening to God so as to understand that He is the only answer to the deepest desire of the human heart,” the communiqué continued. “Several times, the witness of the martyrs of the twentieth century has been evoked to indicate that only a personal relationship with Christ, which becomes a cultural factor, is capable of promoting the evangelizing mission of the Church. The Church is called not so much to react but to be in the forefront in terms of ardor, methods, and expression in presenting the always topical content of her faith: Jesus Christ.”
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