New Vatican document sees an ‘epochal problem’ [News Analysis]

October 23, 2026

An important new Vatican document released this week recognizes that the Catholic Church faces an “epochal” problem in passing along the faith to younger generations. But while offering some valuable insights on the process of evangelization, the document skirts the question of how that problem has arisen. Consequently its recommendations fail to match the severity of the problem that it accurately reports.

Venite ad Me, released on October 22, is a 25,000-word tome, with the subtitle “Considerations on the Transmission of the Faith in an Epochal Change.” Prepared by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF), the document is signed by Cardinal Victor Fernandez, the prefect of that office, and Msgr. Armando Matteo, the secretary for its doctrinal section.

Venite, as the document explains (#138), was prepared in answer to a request from Pope Francis for “a reflection on the transmission of the faith.” Pope Leo XIV gave his approval to the work, which is apparently the last of the DDF projects left over from the previous pontificate.

At the outset, Venite explains that this document is “a set of Considerations, not a Doctrinal Note.” The DDF explains:

For this reason, the text examines a variety of points of view without, however, claiming to settle the matter, which remains open to further analysis and development. This means that these Considerations are not marked, as are other documents of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, by terminological precision and systematic treatment, but instead allow a more discursive style… [#5]

In other words readers should look to Venite not for doctrinal precision, but for thoughts about a crisis in the transmission of the faith. Quoting Pope Leo, the DDF remarks: “In some parts of the world, this transmission has all but ceased.”

What is the Good News?

Following a brief introductory section, the first chapter of Venite plunges into the question of what is the nature of evangelization, the message that the Church brings to the world. Recalling St. John’s reference to the “witness to the light,” the document says: “This true light has a name: Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God made man for the salvation of the world.” Here, the DDF continues, we find “the heart of the Christian faith, and it is the driving force that leads believers—in every age, including our own—to pass on the faith they live.” [#9]

The proclamation of the faith, then, is an invitation to share in the love of Jesus Christ. “This is the good news of the Gospel of the Son—that God is love, forever and for everyone.” [#10] The DDF quotes Pope Benedict’s admonition: “Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an even, with a person who gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.”

Based on that understanding, Venite gives a beautiful explanation of the universal mission to evangelize:

The light of Christ shines, as in a mirror, upon the face of Christians; as it spreads, it comes down to us, so that we too can share in that vision and reflect that light to others, in the same way that, in the Easter liturgy, the light of the paschal candle lights countless other candles. Faith is passed on, we might say, by contact, from one person to another, just as one candle is lit from another. Christians, in their poverty, plant a seed so rich that it becomes a great tree, capable of filling the world with its fruit. [#27]

The DDF insists that God’s love, incarnate in Jesus Christ, is the fundamental message of the Gospel. But Venite says little about how that love is made manifest by Christ’s sacrifice on Calvary. In fact the word “sacrifice” appears only once in this 50-page document. The word “redemption” shows up three times, but never clearly related to redemption from sin. And “sin” itself makes only a single appearance. So the reader never encounters the most profound display of God’s love—and the reason why potential converts are fired with love for Christ—as explained so memorably in St. John’s Gospel [3:16]: “For God so loved the world, that He gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

To say that God is love is undoubtedly a heartening message—and a true one. But it does not carry the same force, the same immediacy, the same incarnational reality as the proclamation of Christ’s death and resurrection, of our redemption from sin and death. The more general approach taken in Venite may encourage a potential convert to recognize the existence of a loving God, but it does not necessarily motivate him to join the Catholic Church.

The family way

Converts, however, are not the only—even the usual—source of new members of the Church. Venite notes that “the family is the first and most essential place for the transmission of the faith” [#31], and in ordinary times the vast majority of Catholics learn the essentials of their faith from their parents. But in our time something has gone seriously wrong:

However, it must be noted that this favorable situation is gradually disappearing. Indeed, as will be discussed in greater detail below, one of the defining characteristics of our era is that, although it retains its importance in certain regions of Africa and Asia, the transmission of the faith within the family has been interrupted in many parts of the world. Consequently, the handing on of the experience of the Christian faith to new generations no longer occurs, so to speak, “automatically.” [#38]

This “crisis in the intergenerational transmission of the faith”—which Pope Francis mentioned in his 2019 Christmas message to the Roman Curia—is portrayed in Venite as an “epochal change.” The persistent use of that word “epochal” throughout the document underlines the gravity of the crisis. At the same time it prompts the reader to ask why the problem has become so acute in our “epoch.”

The breakdown in transmitting the faith is not confined to the family, Venite tells us. The institutional Church, too, has been unsuccessful in evangelizing her own members. The document suggests a reason for this failure: that “the transmission of the faith appears today to have been weakened, since it is increasingly characterized by the presence of the baptized whose lives do not reflect the demands of Baptism, who lack a meaningful relationship to the Church and no longer experience the consolation born of faith.” [#41]

So many Catholic parents are not teaching the faith to their children, and many adult Catholics are not living their faith. This is a grim diagnosis, but give the DDF credit for acknowledging its reality. Still, the analysis in Venite begs the central question: Why has this “epochal change” occurred?

The Vatican document offers only a familiar, unsatisfactory answer to that question, blaming the crisis of faith on an adversary secular culture. Citing a report from bishops in the US, Venite observes that young people especially are swayed by popular culture and social media, which influence them “more than Catholic faith, tradition, and devotion do.” [#55] Again the obvious question arises. Why does the secular culture influence the faithful more than the faith influences the culture?

Oddly, Venite passes lightly over the notion that a society’s fundamental beliefs—its faith—is the central factor in shaping its culture; the “cult” is the basis of the culture. When the document highlights the importance of the “inculturation” of the faith, it intends that “the Gospel message must be made understandable to people who share values and categories that do not perfectly coincide with the Hellenistic-Semitic ones in which the biblical text was originally formulated.” [#104] Perhaps so; but shouldn’t “inculturation” at least be a two-way street, allowing the Catholic faith to reshape societal norms?

Paths not taken

“Despite all the epochal changes, the primary channels for transmitting the faith continue to be person-to-person encounters,” Venite states. The Church has never lacked for gifted evangelists, who can inspire others with the message of the Gospel. The challenge today is to revive the system through which ordinary Catholics, without any special personal gifts, could pass along the faith to their families and their friends.

On this matter Venite does provide helpful suggestions, although they are familiar ones. Evangelizers should use the “language of love,” rather than combative argumentation. The faithful should offer the witness of personal holiness. Priests should give good homilies. Catholics should serve the poor, and engage in volunteer work. All good ideas, but not new—and not nearly commensurate with the “epochal” problem they are intended to address.

If the problem is epochal—and on that question Venite leaves no room for doubt—would it not be wise to consult the thoughts of Catholic leaders from previous generations, from times when the faith was transmitted more successfully? Curiously, the DDF neglects that option. Only four of the 132 footnotes cite a source from the patrimony of the Church prior to Vatican II. Thus the document also fails to exploit the exploit the desire to become a part of a time-honored institution, the power of ties to a glorious history.

More useful are the document’s affirmation of the traditional forms of popular piety, and particularly of pilgrimages. Venite also reminds us that liturgical arts, and especially liturgical music, can touch hearts and minds, and the via pulchritudinis “constitutes an essential language for the transmission of the faith.” [#99]

Far more important, however, is the Eucharistic liturgy itself. “If the heart of Christian proclamation is the encounter with God’s saving love in Christ, the liturgy constitutes the privileged place in which this mystery is celebrated and communicated sacramentally.” [#90] For that very reason it was important to underline the historical reality of the Eucharistic liturgy as Christ’s redemptive sacrifice—which Venite does not do. Converts come into the Catholic Church because they want the sacraments—above all to receive the Body and Blood of their Savior. It is no accident that at a time when even many practicing Catholics do not believe in the Real Presence, and thus do not appreciate the “source and summit” of the faith, the Catholic community has difficulty passing along that faith.

Venite makes one surprising suggestion:

Particular care should also be taken to enable the faithful in every diocese, as well as those who are approaching or returning to the community of believers, to encounter the various liturgical sensibilities present within the tradition of the Catholic Church. [#94]

Could the DDF be hinting that greater familiarity with the Traditional Latin Mass might help to restore the sense of awe and reverence that could inspire more effective evangelization—as Pope Benedict XVI suggested when he released Summorum Pontificum? In light of current Vatican policies, since Traditionis Custodes, that reading of the document seems highly improbable. Yet if Venite had paid greater attention to the wisdom of Tradition—not only in the liturgy—the remedy for our era of “epochal change” might have been more evident.

—News Analysis by Phil Lawler

 

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