"I do think we are culturally a Christian country. I call myself a cultural Christian."

He said this in an interview with Rachel Johnson for LBC radio, in which they discussed how the Muslim month of Ramadan was being celebrated in London's Oxford Street, instead of the Christian feast of Easter.

Dawkins, whose scientist atheism was memorably dismantled by the critique of Terry Eagleton, said in that same interview that he recognised the benefits of Christian culture and enjoyed "living in a culturally Christian country".

At the same time though, he did "not believe a word of the Christian faith".

In slightly different terms, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a former Muslim and now former atheist, recently declared that she has converted to Christianity: the announcement of a political conversion, as a "desire to uphold the legacy of the Judeo-Christian tradition."

This is one of the possible responses to the collapse of cultural Christianity in Europe and in the West: not just in terms of the political inability of the Churches to maintain a certain role of religion in the public square through legislation, however.

It's also a possible response in terms of "ex-culturation" (as French sociologist of religion Danièle Hervieu-Léger called it more than two decades ago) and "de-culturation" (as French political scientist Olivier Roy named it in more recent times).

This is not new.

I remember the attempt in the mid-1990s by Cardinal Camillo Ruini (for many years president of the Italian bishops' conference and John Paul II's vicar for the Diocese of Rome), to launch a "cultural project" for Italian Catholicism.

One of the unintended (or maybe intended) consequences of that project was the rise in Berlusconi's Italy between the mid-1990s and the early 2000s of the so-called "devout atheists" on the right side of the ideological spectrum.

It's a project which evidently did not accomplish its goals given that Italian Catholicism is on its way, even though in its own way, towards ex-culturation and de-culturation similar to other European countries.

Relationship between Gospel and culture

Until a few years ago, a certain kind of progressive and liberal Catholic used to rejoice for the collapse of cultural Christianity, which was seen as a burden from Christendom and an obstacle for the transmission of a purer Gospel message.

Now things appear a little more complex in the relationship between Gospel and culture.

Clearly embracing Christianity instrumentally, for cultural and political reasons, is often a fearful reaction against the diversification of our societies, against the lost dominance of Christianity in favor of the growing presence of other religious identities (especially Islam) in the Western world.

It is not surprising that more and more often these "political" conversions arrive in Europe from the far left or militant secularism.

From a theological point of view, professing an attachment to the culture of Christianity as a defense against other religious and cultural identities is clearly problematic.

The first problem is because a political-cultural Christianity instrumentalises the legacy produced by believers in Jesus Christ (believers in various and always imperfect ways) for goals that are not the ones of the Gospel.

It embraces a particularly narrow view of Christian culture that does not recognise the authority of non-Western Christianities (sometimes with traditions older than the Roman Catholic Church) because they cannot be identified with European Christendom.

Leaving the Christian message in the hands of this kind of "cultural Christianity" entails many consequences and not just in terms of ecumenical and interreligious dialogue and of civil coexistence in our multi-religious societies.

It also prevents a correct interpretation of the Gospel which is not at the service of one particular culture at the exclusion of others.

It is not surprising, therefore, that this new wave of cultural Christianity contains a political theology that both liberal-secular mainstream and progressive Christians clearly do not appreciate because it is a preparation or already part of a civilisational war.

Understanding of "culture"

Two questions arise here.

The first question concerns intellectual and academic work. What are the differences and similarities between this kind of "cultural Christianity" on the right and the radical-progressive political theologies on the left?

Within the Churches in the West, including the Catholic Church, there is another kind of cultural Christianity that risks being similarly opportunistic towards the Gospel.

Important streams in 21st-century political theology around race and gender in academic departments in Anglo-American universities are often a form of cultural attachment to and development of the liberationist turn of Christian thought.

But often without any reference to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the faith perspective, in absence of references to the incarnational-sacramental imagination, ecclesial intentionality, and the graces of the Incarnation and the Resurrection.

This kind of progressive cultural Christianity has been a more welcome guest in academic theology in the West.

It remains to be seen if and how this challenge from "cultural Christians" will impact liberal-progressive theology that operationalizes an understanding of "culture" as a gateway to more diversity, inclusion, and dialogue.

The second question concerns the relationship between faith and culture in today's Church.

It's the symptom of the new semantics of "culture" from something that silently unites in lived experiences to something that becomes a politically militant platform in defense of a lost homogeneity.

But we must pay attention to the intergenerational character of these conversions, which no longer concern only the elderly struggling with nostalgia, but also a certain number of young people.

It's not, as it was in the early post-Vatican II period, an archeological, Agatha Christie-like passion for the splendor of a bygone era. Now it's something different.

Tensions between "the West and the rest"

More crucially, this wave of "cultural Christians" represents one of the tensions between "the West and the rest" during this pontificate.

In ways significantly different from his predecessors, Pope Francis embodies a non-European, "global south" Catholicism that vindicates the need for a process of liberation from Western culture, and a deeper inculturation in local non-Western traditions, in order to be more Catholic.

Conversely, "cultural Christians" in the West are looking for the opposite: a recovery of the cultural legacy of Christianity bestowed in past centuries - philosophy, literature, arts - to preserve some sense of collective self.

This clash of trajectories runs deeper than the usual, lazy, and largely Western "liberal vs. conservative" characterization of what is happening in Catholicism today.

The problem of the relationship between Christianity and culture has re-emerged at this time of disestablishment of the ecclesiastical and theological system created by the Churches in the West over the centuries.

Theologically, Dawkins's "a-Christian Christianity" is the wrong answer to that problem.

But it's also an unconscious way to ask the real question that is on the horizon: what it means, in the globaliesd Church of today, to begin a new phase of inculturation in the West now ex-culturated from Christianity.

• First published in La Croix International
• Massimo Faggioli is an Italian academic, Church historian, professor of theology and religious studies at Villanova University and columnist for La Croix International

The stereotype is that he or she is a sort of reactionary simpleton, a bit mean, a bit senile, obsessing over abstruse texts, preferring Mass to sleeping in on Sundays, and insisting on obeying an antiquated sect whose main activity is covering up sexual abuse.

This pious person has only three obsessions: to forbid women from doing as they please with their bodies, to prevent LGBT individuals from living their lives, and to force the sick to suffer for as long as possible.

This kind of Catholic is logically the last of its kind, with a perspective that's outdated and irrelevant.

To top it all off, this clueless person has yet to realise that Jesus never existed, as people like the prolific French philosopher Michel Onfray assert.

If this kind of figure does not appeal to you, it doesn't for me, either.

And it certainly isn't what motivated 7,000 adults to officially become Catholics this past Easter here in France.

This large number of adults who were baptized during the Easter Vigil is an unprecedented leap for the Church in this country.

For several months now, Catholic observers have sensed that something is happening, which escapes the official discourse of French society. In some dioceses, such as Montpellier in the south, the catechumens were twice as numerous this year compared to last year.

Conversion is possible for anyone

It's shocking! How could we have foreseen it?

How can these people want to jump into holy water when everything in modern society attempts to dissuade them, and when they don't even know what a holy water font is anymore?

Do these new Catholics that have emerged from nowhere ignore the image of the Church that is conveyed by the media and social networks?

Did they ask for permission from the rulers of secularized society? Are they misinformed? Manipulated? After all the efforts made to repel them, how can they show up in good faith?

No one knows if this springtime of faith will last.

Sometimes there can be late frosts that ruin a beautiful bloom, and then - poof! - there goes the harvest we were dreaming of.

But meanwhile, God laughs at our shock, as it is written in the second Psalm:

"Why do the nations protest and the peoples conspire in vain?

Kings on earth rise up and princes plot together against the LORD and against his anointed one:

"Let us break their shackles and cast off their chains from us!

"The one enthroned in heaven laughs; the Lord derides them."

The mischievous Creator probably makes fun of our pastoral plans that aim for quantifiable results.

God finds Catholics in myriad ways, even in places where we don't go.

Le Pèlerin, one of La Croix's sister publications, once recounted the humble testimony of a young parliamentary assistant whom the Messiah came to fetch when he was 12-years-old.

The young man secretly bought a Bible with his pocket money, and the damage was done.

Reading it, he became a Christian.

He is not the only one to whom such a mishap has occurred, and conversion is possible for anyone, whether they be on the political left or political right.

God finds a way to draw people to himself

With all this in mind, however, the Gospel tells us that the disciples scatter when the situation turns dark. 1

In the Passion narrative according to St. Mark, only two outsiders confess, by their action or by words, the messianic status of Christ.

A woman breaks a jar of expensive perfume over Jesus' head, and when everything is finished in the most astounding of apparent failures, a Roman centurion - not even a lifelong Catholic — proclaims the crucified one as the "Son of God".

Even if they weren't the greatest theologians, these new Christians who knew nothing at all grasped an important truth - it's at the lowest point that the Most High lets himself be touched.

When the Church is flat on the ground and we lukewarm disciples wander around dazed in the messiness of our modern culture, God finds a way to draw people to himself.

This springtime of faith might indeed be a new beginning.

• First published in La Croix. Republished with permission
• Jean-Pierre Denis, a veteran journalist and editor, is the publisher of La Croix

Flores (pictured) is a member of the global assembly's preparatory commission.

He says the Synod aims to share Christ and his Gospel more effectively. We can't respond with the Gospel if we don't know the reality people face, he says.

"We can't respond to the air."

He says the synod is designed to teach Catholics to speak with one another - not past one another..

"It's that basic ... Sometimes we're not even addressing the same issues, even though we're using similar words.

"There's a need to hear, think and pray, and hopefully the synod will suggest ... we can integrate certain ways by which respectfully things can be spoken without fear.

"The church can afford to be realistic about what people think - there's no need to be afraid of what people think," Flores says.

"There are voices in the church that are also the voices of our own history, of our own tradition, of our own previous experience — and that too has to be taken into account," he added.

"If we do this right … in our own local churches, we can develop a style of listening and decision-making that involves more hearing from people 'in the trenches,' ..." he says.

Issues of importance to the universal church are being discussed "ultimately so we can be effective in the missionary work of the church," he said.

"The communion of the church is at the heart of it — how we talk to each other, how we work together, how we listen to each other, how we make decisions in the local church and even the universal church" he said.

"There's a way to do that that is uniquely in keeping with the way of Christ, and that's what the synod will be asking about.

"It's really a 'how' question: How can we do this?"

Flores is also leading the US Bishops Conference on the synod process.

Source

• The Florida Catholic

It does not imply that God is nowhere outside the Church, Anglican priest and theologian Professor Nigel Biggar said in discussion with The Tablet in Dublin about the divine commission and colonialism.

Biggar is the emeritus Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology at Oxford. He made the comment when he was in Dublin to deliver a talk on coping with the past and lessons from colonialism and cancel culture.

"God is outside the Church," Biggar said.

He pointed out that the New Testament makes it clear that the Holy Spirit is not confined to the Church.

"The Holy Spirit is out there in the world. The world is God's world and God was there first."

He said the Christian gospel is relevant to people of other faiths.

"First of all it can illuminate things that people already intuit but are not quite sure of. Sometimes it does result in a radical change as well as a kind of clarification."

He dismissed the assumption that "Christian missionaries were the lackeys of empire" and were "complicit in the abuses of colonial rule."

Colonial rule was not always abusive, he said.

Colonial officials, on the whole, did not want missionaries in the colonies, he explained.

He went on to cite the East India Company's ban on missionaries in India until the early part of the 19th century.

"It is often the case, whether, in New Zealand or Canada, missionaries were among humanitarians who lobbied the imperial Government to stop abuses."

Cancel culture

In relation to the so-called 'cancel culture', Biggar said those who cancel do so "because they can't answer."

He asked why management in publishing houses and universities are "so willing to indulge the illiberal clamouring of woke junior members.

"It is fine for young colleagues or any colleagues to have progressive opinions. But I don't quite understand why the adults in some publishing houses or universities yield so readily," he said.

He blamed European post-modernist philosophies for encouraging people to regard all hierarchies and all social orders as "designed to entrench oppressive power" and which must be uprooted "by whatever means possible."

Source

• The Tablet

According to a PBS report in CathNews, VoteCast declared that 50 percent of Catholics backed Trump, while 49 percent voted for Biden.

Many Catholics, like many other Christians, appear to be predominantly guided by their preferred political leaders, nationalistic tendencies, the culture, conservative or progressive leanings, their wallet and their often unconscious prejudices. These unhealthy tendencies are not conducive to building unity within Catholicism, nor overall Christianity. It doesn't have to be this way.

Let's really try to live our lives in such a way that everything we think, feel, say and do faithfully reflects what Jesus taught us as recorded in the four Gospel accounts of our Lord.

And let's also go the extra mile: Let's apply the words and actions of Jesus to the cultural, economic, and the political areas of our nation and world. Now you might be thinking how on earth - especially in today's highly fractured societies - can we possibly do this?

Well, let's consult the angel Gabriel. When this messenger from the Almighty visited the teenage Jewish woman Mary and conveyed to her God's desire to take on human nature by being conceived in her virgin womb, Gabriel put to rest her natural query saying, "For nothing will be impossible for God."

But while of course, this is true, we like Mary need to give our wholehearted "yes" to God. We need to cooperate with God's life of grace in order for grace to be fully operative in our lives - and by extension in our suffering world.

But how can we translate this into public policies and civil laws with so many different contrasting opinions?

Let's let the Gospel lead the way!

In the last judgment scene of Matthew's Gospel, Jesus rewards with eternal life those who have loved him by feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, welcoming the stranger, clothing the naked, consoling the sick and imprisoned.

And so, the Gospel mandate is for us to fully address the legitimate needs of the many Americans and countless human beings around the world lacking sufficient nutritious food and clean water, decent clothing and housing, quality comprehensive healthcare, humane restorative prison reform and a warm welcome.

It is necessary to remember that as important as it is for us to individually respond to these needs, it is also absolutely essential for governments to fully respond to these needs as well.

And certainly, Jesus' total nonviolent example calls us to convert our high tech swords into instruments of peace. Thus Catholics and all Christians - if we are to be faithful to the Gospel - need to take the Gospel of peace to heart.

Exactly what types of laws, budgets and public policies that need to be enacted is open to honest, respectful and compassionate debate. But that debate needs to lead to timely and fully adequate comprehensive solutions.

If each one of us starts and finishes with the Gospel mandate that every single human being - born and unborn - deserves not only to live, but deserves to live with dignity in a world where people come before profit, where the care of the earth outweighs corporate greed and where nonviolent solutions replace war, we will surely find ways to move governments, corporations and economies toward the right way - the Gospel way!

• Tony Magliano is an internationally syndicated Catholic social justice and peace columnist. He is available to speak at diocesan or parish gatherings. Tony can be reached at tmag6@comcast.net.

Pell spoke to an online silent retreat hosted by the Australian Catholic Students' Association about suffering and the tools one can use to remain steadfast in faith through hard times.

Pell says his 13 months in prison were "difficult and unpleasant," but not the worst possible form of suffering. In fact, his imprisonment reinforced in him the truth of Christian view of redemptive suffering.

"I'm still teaching the same Christian message and I'm here simply to say that it works. Not in the sense that I was acquitted, but that this Christian teaching helped me to survive."

Two years ago Pell was convicted of multiple counts of sexual abuse.

On April 7 this year Australia's High Court overturned his six-year prison sentence. It ruled Pell should not have been found guilty of the charge and that the prosecution had not proven their case beyond a reasonable doubt.

Before the silent retreat started, Pell offered five suggestions for people experiencing emotional hardship, including grief, loss, and personal suffering.

He suggested exercise, avoiding large amounts of alcohol, eating well and regularly, sleeping a certain number of hours a night and waking up at the same time each day.

Following these points and ensuring regular exercise helped him when he was in prison, Pell told the students. He explained the special importance for young people to take this advice sooner rather than later.

By creating these "good habits of mind and habits of practice," a person will be led in the right direction during inevitable, intense times of suffering, he said.

"Whereas, if you've been sloppy and ill-disciplined and selfish all your life, it makes it so much harder to rise to the challenge," he said.

This Easter Pell shared information about of his incarceration and how his Christian faith helped him bear it.

"I have just spent 13 months in jail for a crime I didn't commit, one disappointment after another. I knew God was with me, but I didn't know what He was up to, although I realised He has left all of us free."

"But with every blow it was a consolation to know I could offer it to God for some good purpose like turning the mass of suffering into spiritual energy."

"The only Son of God did not have an easy run and suffered more than his share. Jesus redeemed us and we can redeem our suffering by joining it to His and offering it to God."

Source

• Catholic News Agency
• Image: America Magazine

Francis dedicated the Mass to people dying alone or who have already died, saying: "Today we pray for the deceased who have died because of the pandemic.

"They have died alone, without the caresses of their loved ones. So many did not even have a funeral. May the Lord welcome them in His glory."

According to John Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Centre, as of 5 May, worldwide, more than 250,000 people have died of COVID-19.

Praying for the isolated elderly is a theme close to Francis' heart. Calling the elderly "our roots, our story, our history," Francis asked the Lord to be close to them.

"Let us pray today for the elderly, especially for those who are isolated or in nursing homes. They are afraid, afraid of dying alone," Pope Francis said before Mass on April 15.

In his homily Tuesday, Francis reflected on Gospel reading (John 10:22-30), where Jesus is asked to say if he is the Christ.

Jesus says he has already told his listeners, but they have not believed him because they are not among his sheep.

In the light of this, Francis urged Catholics to ask themselves: "What makes me stop outside the door that is Jesus?"

Francis identified several barriers to progress towards Jesus.

One barrier he mentioned is the rigidity of heart.

"Jesus reproached the doctors of the law for their rigidity in interpreting the law, which is not faithfulness. Faithfulness is always a gift of God; rigidity is only security for oneself."

Rigidity leads us away from Jesus's wisdom and robs us of our freedom, Francis said.

He also named two further obstacles: acedia, which he defined as a tiredness that "takes away our desire to strive forward" and makes us lukewarm, and clericalism, which he described as a disease that takes away the freedom of the faithful.

"...we cannot follow Jesus without freedom. ‘At times freedom might go too far, and we might slip and fall.' Yes, that's true. But this is slipping before becoming free."

Source

• Catholic News Agency
• Image: Pinterest

Survey results were released by Cigna, a global health service company, based on the UCLA loneliness scale, an instrument that measures and assesses subjective feelings of loneliness, as well as social isolation, by using a 20-item questionnaire.

Four significant patterns related to feelings of loneliness and social isolation emerged from the survey of more than 20,000 U.S. adults, age 18 years and older:

Nearly half of the respondents reported feeling alone, occasionally or continuously (46 percent), or left out (47 percent).

• One in four rarely or never feel as if there are people who truly understand them.
• Two in five feel that their relationships are inconsequential (43 percent) and that they are isolated from others (43 percent).
• One in five report they rarely or never feel close to other people (20 percent) or that there is anyone they can talk to (18 percent).

Bob Dylan once said that New York is the only place where you can freeze to death on a busy street and no one will even notice.

Although urban centres are incredibly dense and swarming with people, the density only seems to compound the loneliness.

Thus, the confluence of urbanization and globalization is creating an expanding mission field for the church, given most of the global population continues to migrate steadily into urban centres.

What then can we do? Continue reading

But, of course, you know all of this unless you are more removed from civilization than, say, the Starks of Winterfell or the White Walkers who roam beyond the wall.

If you are clueless about all of this, devotees of Game of Thrones — and they are legion—might consider you as uncouth as a drunken Dothraki warrior.

But take heart because, if you are a faithful Christian, you are already engaged in a historical struggle ever so much the grander than any clash of dynasties.

Game of Thrones, the HBO adaptation of George R. R. Martin's medieval fantasy series, is an epic dramatic struggle between the forces of good and evil.

To the credit of the show's eight seasons, it has often been difficult to know who was winning and who was not.

Sometimes it was a struggle to settle upon who was good and who was bad. At times you could only see who was bad and who was even worse. Circumstances shifted, and people changed.

The only constant was that the powerful oppressed the weak.

That remained true even when the weak became the powerful.

If this explains the television series to the culturally clueless, it also explains the Christian faith to the spiritually impoverished.

Game of Thrones is a terrific drama, played out in fictional history.

Christianity's core claim is that history itself is a great drama, an epic struggle between light and darkness.

You might not immediately learn this by asking the average believer to explain the Christian faith.

Instead, you are likely to listen to a list of teachings, called doctrines, which are to be believed without evidence, and moral precepts, which are to be observed solely on the authority of those who promulgate them.

Yet the core of the Christian faith is that good and evil are at war and have been for as far back as memory goes.

Scholars call this "salvation history," but ordinary people know it as the ongoing, daily struggle between right and wrong, one that surges around and within every human being.

Moreover, just as in Game of Thrones, in the real world it is hard to know who is what and which side is winning.

Good and evil are entwined in a violent vortex.

The sole constant is that the powerful continue to oppress the weak. Continue reading

While the church must be generous to "individuals that are not able to find a way of living in their own country," this is not the case for many Muslim migrants "who are opportunists," he said.

As evidence that Muslim immigration is having an effect even in the United States, he cited the book "No Go Zones: How Sharia Law is Coming to a Neighborhood Near You," written by former Breitbart News reporter Raheem Kassam.

(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breitbart_Newsis a far-right syndicated American news, opinion and commentary website).

He then went on to tell those at the conference that Islam "believes itself to be destined to rule the world.

"You don't have to be a rocket scientist to see what has happened in Europe," he said, pointing to the large Muslim immigrant populations in France, Germany and Italy.

Burke's comments add to the debate among Catholics about applying Gospel precepts to the large numbers of migrants arriving in Western nations from Africa and the Middle East.

While the church must be generous to "individuals that are not able to find a way of living in their own country," he said this is not the case for many Muslim migrants, "who are opportunists."

A cause of Europe's Muslim influx can be attributed to Christian nations' abandonment of traditional moral norms, Burke continued.

"Muslims have said that they are able today to accomplish what they were not able to accomplish in the past with armaments because Christians no longer are ready to defend their faith, what they believe; they are no longer ready to defend the moral law," the cardinal said.

Another reason for the demographic shift Burke noted is that "Christians are not reproducing themselves," referring to the widespread use of contraceptives.

In this context, Burke said Catholics have a duty to instruct migrants on "what is bankrupt in the culture" into which they are received.

They should even to try to work with migrants "to recover what is true culture," which includes recognising the dignity of life, respect for sexual morality and proper worship of God.

In view of these considerations, limiting "large-scale Muslim immigration is in fact, as far as I'm concerned, a responsible exercise of one's patriotism," Burke added.

Burke's views differ from those of Pope Francis, who has made a generous attitude toward migrants a cornerstone of his pontificate.

Francis stresses the Christian duty to "welcome the stranger" over political and demographic considerations.

At the same time, he has repeatedly added that government leaders have a responsibility to assess how many migrants their countries truly can integrate. This includes considering including the financial costs of helping immigrants learn the local language and customs.

Source

• Catholic Herald
• Image: National Catholic Register

Former North Korean Christian missionary Kim Chung-seong went on to explain why the country is so afraid:

"[It is] because the Bible and the Gospel speaks the truth. Once the light shines in the dark room, there is light in the room," he told the summit's political and religious leaders and representatives from 130 countries and territories.

The North Korean dictatorship is considered one of the worst human rights violators in the world.

Everyone is forced to worship the leader, currently Kim Jong-un, Open Door UK said in a recent report.

"Freedom of religion or belief does not exist and is, in fact, profoundly suppressed," the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom's 2017 annual report says.

Despite the torture, forced hard labour, extraordinarily cruel treatment and death penalties the faith continues to spread, Kim said.

"I had to get out, or die."

Kim, who was one of many persecuted Christians speaking at the summit, has been living in South Korea since 2004.

He broadcasts a Christian radio programme every day into parts of North Korea.

He also helps send North Koreans Gospel messages, Christian music and world news on USB drives and SD memory cards.

Kim said the North Korean government uses a "façade" network — the Korea Christian Association.

Its role is to find the Christians in the country, make them think they're an authentic Christian group and give them false information.

The façade network also gives a false impression of religious freedom and religious pluralism in North Korea.

Summit keynote speakers included Washington D.C's Cardinal Donal Wuerl and US Vice President Mike Pence.

Source

• Catholic Online
• National Catholic Register
• Breitbart
• Image: Life Funds for North Korean Refugees
  

Pope Francis said that the synod was not about settling all the issues to do with the family, but rather to see them in the light of the Gospel.

He said the Gospel is always a vital source of newness for the Church.

This newness of the Gospel is "against all those who would ‘indoctrinate' it in dead stones to be hurled at others".

"It was also about laying closed hearts, which bare the closed hearts which frequently hide even behind the Church's teachings or good intentions, in order to sit in the chair of Moses and judge, sometimes with superiority and superficiality, difficult cases and wounded families.

"It was about trying to open up broader horizons, rising above conspiracy theories and blinkered viewpoints . . . ."

The first thing the synod was about, the Pope said, was "urging everyone to appreciate the importance of the institution of the family and of marriage between a man and a woman, based on unity and indissolubility, and valuing it as the fundamental basis of society and human life".

Pope Francis added that "the synod experience also made us better realise that the true defenders of doctrine are not those who uphold its letter, but its spirit; not ideas but people; not formulae but the gratuitousness of God's love and forgiveness".

"This is in no way to detract from the importance of formulae, laws and divine commandments," the Pope noted.

"But rather to exalt the greatness of the true God, who does not treat us according to our merits or even according to our works but solely according to the boundless generosity of his mercy."

Preaching at the final Mass of the synod the next day, the Pope warned against a temptation to practice a "spirituality of illusion" that ignores people's struggles or sees things only as we wish them to be.

Sources

• Reuters
• National Catholic Reporter
• Full Text of Pope's closing address to the synod
• Full text of Pope's homily at synod final Mass
• Image: Yahoo News

But does the increasingly secular culture mean believers need to adjust how they share the gospel?

"Yes, I mean, and no," said Tim Keller, founding pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City.

"No in that you don't change the good news, but, yes, it does I think change the way you share it."

Keller is the author of several well-known Christian books, including "Counterfeit Gods" and "The Reason for God."

His new book is "Preaching: Communicating Faith in an Age of Skepticism."

Keller said people frequently alter their method of communicating with other people based on what they know about them, and sharing Christ is no different.

"If I'm talking to somebody who's skeptical or somebody who's sympathetic, I change the way I talk," Keller explained.

"We're that way with everyone. Hopefully, if you know how to communicate, you instinctively say things differently when you're trying to bridge a barrier. Now that we live in a more secular society, we're going to have to change the way we communicate the gospel."

According to Keller, a key step to engaging this generation is to be able to explain your personal relationship with Christ through His word.

"The gospel has to be real to you," he said.

"It has to have really changed your life. It can't just be something you've adopted because you inherited it. If you simply say, 'Well, this is the truth,' people aren't going to listen. Instead, you have to say, 'Here's how it works. Here's how it functions in my heart, how it functions in my life.' There's got to be authenticity, and you've got to make it life-related. Otherwise, people won't listen."

Keller said authenticity is critical to the millennial generation, although he said young people are often quite hypocritical on this issue.

"Millennials are very high on authenticity," he said.

"They're often self-righteous about it. I'm not sure that they're any less self-righteous or any more tolerant than their grandparents, or parents or great-grandparents. What's funny about the millennials is, like every other generation, whatever they value they're self-righteous about it. 'We have it and nobody else does.' And then they look down their noses and so they're no better."

That being said, Keller said authenticity needs to be at the core of our witness.

"Paul says, 'We didn't just preach the gospel, but we shared our very hearts with you (1 Thessalonians 2:8).' Therefore, you really do have to do that and it's never been more important," he said. Continue reading

Image: The Broken Network

In an interview with America Magazine and Argentina's La Nacion, Cardinal Kasper said some cardinals and bishops fear a domino-like collapse in the Church's moral structure.

"That's their fear. This is all linked to ideology, an ideological understanding of the Gospel that the Gospel is like a penal code," Cardinal Kasper said.

But citing a reference to St Thomas Aquinas by Pope Francis in Evangelii Gaudium, the cardinal said "the Gospel is the gift of the Holy Spirit, which is in the soul of faithful and becomes operating in love".

"It is a living reality in the Church and we have to walk with the whole people of God and see what the needs of the people are.

"Then we have to make a discernment in the light of the Gospel, which is not a code of doctrines and commandments," Cardinal Kasper said.

At a consistory of cardinals earlier this year, Cardinal Kasper suggested, in limited cases, divorced and civilly remarried Catholics could be admitted to Communion following a period of penance.

This has been opposed by several cardinals and bishops in books published prior to the synod.

In the interview, Cardinal Kasper said "we cannot simply take one phrase of the Gospel of Jesus and from that deduce everything".

"You need a hermeneutic to see the whole of the Gospel and of Jesus' message and then differentiate between what is doctrine and what is discipline.

"Discipline can change," he said.

Issues of marriage and family "cannot be decided only from above, from the Church hierarchy, and especially you cannot just quote old texts of the last century, you have to look at the situation today, and then you make a discernment of the spirits and come to concrete results".

"I think this is the approach of Pope Francis, whereas many others start from doctrine and then use a mere deductive method."

The dual synod process, the questionnaire and the open debate on the issue of Communion for the divorced and civilly remarried show a "dialogical" Church in line with that envisaged by St John XXIII and Pope Paul VI, he added.

Cardinal Kasper said the 12 months between this synod and the 2015 one will be crucial, as bishops "will have time to speak to their people".

Source

• America
• Image: The Telegraph

194. This message is so clear and direct, so simple and eloquent, that no ecclesial interpretation has the right to relativize it. The Church's reflection on these texts ought not to obscure or weaken their force, but urge us to accept their exhortations with courage and zeal. Why complicate something so simple? Conceptual tools exist to heighten contact with the realities they seek to explain, not to distance us from them. This is especially the case with those biblical exhortations which summon us so forcefully to brotherly love, to humble and generous service, to justice and mercy towards the poor. Jesus taught us this way of looking at others by his words and his actions. So why cloud something so clear? We should not be concerned simply about falling into doctrinal error, but about remaining faithful to this light-filled path of life and wisdom. For "defenders of orthodoxy are sometimes accused of passivity, indulgence, or culpable complicity regarding the intolerable situations of injustice and the political regimes which prolong them".[161]

195. When Saint Paul approached the apostles in Jerusalem to discern whether he was "running or had run in vain" (Gal 2:2), the key criterion of authenticity which they presented was that he should not forget the poor (cf. Gal 2:10). This important principle, namely that the Pauline communities should not succumb to the self-centred lifestyle of the pagans, remains timely today, when a new self-centred paganism is growing. We may not always be able to reflect adequately the beauty of the Gospel, but there is one sign which we should never lack: the option for those who are least, those whom society discards.

196. Sometimes we prove hard of heart and mind; we are forgetful, distracted and carried away by the limitless possibilities for consumption and distraction offered by contemporary society. This leads to a kind of alienation at every level, for "a society becomes alienated when its forms of social organization, production and consumption make it more difficult to offer the gift of self and to establish solidarity between people".[162]

This is the question the creators of Spears The Musical: The Gospel According To Britney ask in regard to their new opera, which tells the story of Jesus Christ through the music of Britney Spears.

According to the musical's website, the show will chronicle the life, death and resurrection of Jesus using Britney's hits like "Stronger," "One More Time," "Lucky" and "Crazy."

Spears was developed by Patrick Blute, a 23-year-old Columbia University graduate, who debuted the show in April 2012 at the college to a sold-out crowd.

Continue Reading

"Newness and life will not come out of a Church which still wants to look on itself as an institution of power, even a renewed institution, or from a Church which is simply a focal point of organised doing good or social reform," Archbishop Martin said.

The archbishop of Dublin said the church must "witness more concretely to the message of Jesus".

"We have to live in such a way that the energy of life and vitality which spring from Jesus' Resurrection can really touch our hearts and change our church," he said.

Speaking in Dublin's Pro Cathedral, Archbishop Martin said a renewed Church would be "pro-life in the fullest sense of that term".

"If Christians have a passion for life then they should be in the forefront in the fight for life, at every moment of its existence . . .

"We have to defend the right to life and we must at the same time always accompany that defence with a commitment to ensure that all can live their lives with a level of dignity worthy of the Lord of life in whose image they have been created," he said.

Archbishop Martin said Christians should be driving forces for a society in which young people receive reasons for hope.

"We have great young people but our years of prosperity have not left them a legacy of hope," he said.

The Dublin-born archbishop had a series of Vatican appointments, including the Holy See's permanent observer at the United Nations Office in Geneva, before being appointed coadjutor archbishop of Dublin in 2003. He succeeded as archbishop in 2004.

Source:

Irish Times

Image: RTE News

In a heartfelt, simple homily, the Argentinian pope laid out a clear moral path for the 1.2-billion-member Church, which is beset by scandals, intrigue and strife.

Addressing cardinals in the frescoed Sistine Chapel the day after his election there, Jorge Bergoglio said the Church should be more focused on the Gospels of Jesus Christ.

"We can walk all we want, we can build many things, but if we don't proclaim Jesus Christ, something is wrong. We would become a compassionate NGO and not a Church which is the bride of Christ," he said, speaking in Italian without notes. Continue reading

Godzone is a re-vamped version of the Gospel of Luke, featuring the text of the New Testament interspersed with the life stories of 10 international players whose lives have been transformed by their Christian faith.

Past and present players - including All Black Thorn, Fijian captain Deacon Manu, Black Fern Doris Taufateau, Scottish prop Euan Murray, Wallabies flanker David Pocock and former captain Nick Farr-Jones - describe their paths to faith in the book, of which 25,000 copies have been published.

Source

• Stuff.co.nz
• Image: Stuff.co.nz