Editorial : THE FUTURE: Evangelising

Editorial: 04.10.18

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FAITH magazine is glad to add its voice to the

welcome given to Bishop Robert Barron,

from the USA, to Britain for the 2018 Eucharistic

Congress. Bishop Barron has a strong and welldeserved

reputation as an evangelist – he has taken

seriously the challenge of teaching the Catholic

Faith in new ways across the New Media – DVDs,

twitter, blogs, and websites with glorious images

and music - and in talks and lectures to groups

large and larger. He has opened up for millions of people the insights of walking in the Holy Land where Christ himself walked, and of visiting some of the great shrines and churches and

cathedrals of the world. He has shown the huge beauty of centuries of Christian art and

architecture and the messages and meanings they convey. And he has patiently and with

a pleasant, informative way of communicating, he has opened up the Scripture readings

of the Church’s year Sunday by Sunday, feeding people’s souls and helping many priests

through many Sunday homilies to do the same.

It was a wise choice as a keynote speaker for what we all hope will be a memorable,

indeed landmark event for the Church in Britain.

Evangelisation

We need a boost to evangelisation. For too long, it was assumed that people in this

country had some basic notion of Christianity, and that Catholics, in particular, had a

sort of tribal association with the Faith and a loyalty to the idea of Sunday Mass. People

used to say “the Faith is caught, not taught” and there was an emphasis in Catholic

schools on organising fund-raising events for charity or encouraging forms of service to

the local community, rather than on teaching doctrine or on answering the deep and

often challenging questions raised by the young in a secular society. Even the Eucharist

was often presented as a sort of community meal, with a good neighbourly feeling being

nourished by gathering together.

Things have changed in recent – very recent – years. Today’s young priests – and

we don’t have enough of them, as the poor religious formation noted above failed to excite interest in the idea of answering God’s call to service in His vineyard - are fully

aware of the bleak spiritual state of our country. They do not see the Mass as a cheerful

opportunity for neighbourly togetherness, but as the sacrifice of Calvary binding us to

eternity. Eucharistic devotion has been revived. Young people gather for Night Fever

with adoration before the Blessed Sacrament in a city church and teams of missionaries

walking the streets with lanterns welcoming people in to light a candle and offer a prayer.

Summer gatherings at Walsingham and elsewhere focus on Eucharistic adoration too,

with teams of priests hearing confessions.

The treasures of the Faith

Good preaching, opening up the treasures of the Faith,

is central to the Church’s future. We need well-formed,

well-instructed priests and teachers. We need to

recognise that people do actually want to know about

the Church’s teaching: they are often genuinely baffled

about it. And this recognition also needs to include the frightening reality of the wounds

that many people in Western society carry which are in certain specific ways different

from the wounds of the past. Where once poverty and hunger stalked the cities of Britain,

now it is violent crime and a drug-infested culture, broken families, children introduced to

pornography and sexual perversions via the internet. Where people were once physically

hungry, we now have a national problem of obesity. Where once people struggled to

obtain a few simple toys for their children today there are households awash with plastic

and electronic gifts but where the children are lonely and screen-addicted.

Powerful

Saint John Paul called the Church to a New Evangelisation, and showed the way with

powerful missionary journeys and pioneering new events such as World Youth Day.

The odd thing is that WYD was essentially an old-fashioned idea: a big rally with preaching.

It’s almost 19th century – an emphasis on a great morale-boosting gathering with a strong

Christian uplifting message and large-scale

communal worship. But it began at the end of the

20th century when most commentators tended

to the view that such events belonged to the past,

with Billy Graham’s rallies the last of such things.

Then WYD - against expectations – proved hugely

popular, a gigantic and magnificent event that grew from year to year, and St John Paul

the Great had opened the way for something important and new.

How to go ahead

People like to gather for big events – the 2010 Papal Visit also proved this – and they

need a sense of connection with each other, with the past, and with God. So all plans for

the future for parishes serious about evangelisation might include, wherever possible,

summer street processions with the Blessed Sacrament, candlelit processions to a

graveyard or cemetery for All Souls’ Day, Christmas carols at railway stations and from

house-to-house, and similar activities.

There is no slick way to re-convert Britain.

This isn’t a matter of trying to impose

Christianity by government diktat. The light

of Christ must permeate the culture, winning

hearts and opening up closed minds.

There is no quick-fix. People cannot be nagged or bullied into turning to Christ: they

must be helped to find him. The Church has the truth: offering it will mean that many will

not be able to stomach it at first. We will need, as always, to find people’s real spiritual

needs and to offer real assistance.

We aren’t alone: we have all of Heaven with us. Saints –those who taught the Faith in

this land before us, and above all those who died as martyrs for doing so – will respond

when we invoke their prayers.

Determination and hope

The Eucharistic Congress should be a sign of determination and of hope. Those attending

should return home with a real desire to communicate the glory of Christ. That will not

happen without humility, an understanding of our own inadequacy and a frank admission

that we have not been doing very well in

recent decades. We are entitled also to a

recognition of the hugeness of the task:

we face an unfriendly culture which in

so many ways presents great challenges.

But we have great and glorious truths to

impart and once we have fully absorbed

that fact, we can set about working on ways of fulfilling the task.

Beautiful and dignified liturgy: no gimmicks, no silly attempts to intersperse chatty

remarks or crass jokes. A new approach to music – it really is time to call a halt to earpounding

from electric guitars in church. Lots of Eucharistic adoration, opportunities for

confession, and sound teaching on both these subjects from the Sunday pulpit. Good

teaching for children when they are brought together in First Communion groups.

Outdoor processions, especially with the Blessed

Sacrament. Celebration of feasts and festivals: the

drama of Holy Week and Easter, the joy of feast-days

that transform an ordinary weekday into something

marvellous. Popular devotions with Marian devotions

in May and the Rosary in October, and graves blessed

in November. All this, plus outreach with comeand-

discover meetings, and street carol-singing at

Christmas and lantern-led walks to shrines. All of that

is basic stuff for parish life, and doesn’t involve much more than dedication, love and a

real desire to live the Faith to the full.

Notes:

Editorial

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Faith Magazine

September - October 2018

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The Faith Vision

Editorial: 10.11.22

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The Church refused to engage with modern science. The Second Vatican Council explained the urgent need to do so.

The Faith Movement: a time of renewal

Article: 01.09.22

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The Faith Movement has a joyful understanding of God and the mission of the Church, seeing Christ as the Lord of History and recognising that He has a special call to men and women of each era, including our own.