Benedict XVI: preach the Gospel” always and everywhere"
Vatican City (AsiaNews) - Proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ always and everywhere; the Holy See today released the "Motu Proprio" “Ubicumque et semper" with which Benedict XVI has established the dicastery for the New Evangelization, entrusted to 'Archbishop Rino Fisichella. In his document, the Pope recalls that changes in recent decades have led to profound transformations in the life of the world and the West in particular, but not only, mankind has experienced "undeniable benefits”, but there has also been ”a disturbing loss of the sense of the sacred, to the point questioning those very foundations which seemed indisputable, that faith in God as creator and provider, the revelation of Jesus Christ, only Savior, and the common understanding of fundamental human experiences such as Birth, death, living in a family, the reference to a natural moral law”. "All of this has been hailed by some as liberation”, in societies of ancient Christian tradition, and with a rapid knock on effect on the rest of the world. But, said the Pontiff, “soon many realized the interior wasteland that was born there where man, in an attempt to be the only arbitrator of his nature and destiny, finds himself without that which is the basis for all things”.
Benedict XVI recalled that Paul VI and John Paul II were greatly concerned by the phenomenon of a collective loss of faith, saying: "Now religious indifference and total practical insignificance of God for life’s serious problems are no less alarming and subversive than openly declared atheism. And the Christian faith, while it survives in some of its traditional and ritual manifestation, tends to be removed from the most significant moments of existence, which are the moments of birth, suffering and death". The Pope added: "I consider it appropriate to offer adequate responses so that the whole Church, regenerated by the power of the Holy Spirit, presents herself to the contemporary world with a missionary zeal that can promote a new evangelization."
Several times in the document, Benedict XVI uses the term "mission" and "missionary zeal" is no coincidence that his analysis provides merciless insights: "we are also unfortunately familiar with the fact that there are areas that appear almost completely de-Christianized, in which the light of faith has relied on the testimony of small communities: these lands, which would require a renewed proclamation of the Gospel, appear to be particularly refractory to many aspects of the Christian message. "Benedict XVI concludes the " Motu proprio" with a sentence that tends to ward off malevolent interpretations and misunderstandings about the intentions of his initiative, and mission in general: "...at the root of all evangelization there is not a human project of expansion, but the desire to share the priceless gift that God wanted to give us, by making us participants in his own life".
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03/12/2012
