Indian synod fathers speak about new evangelization

October 15, 2012 - The Synod of Bishops currently taking place in the Vatican, Oct. 7-28, heard Saturday morning from 24 participants on various issues on the new evangelization. Three of the speakers were from India. In his address to the synod, Indian priest, Fr. Panthaplamthottiyil, Prior General of the Carmelitess of Mary Immaculate, said that attempts at new evangelization must focus mostly on a Word-based faith formation imparted to the faithful, who thirst for the Word of God. He called for serious attempts to use mass media for evangelization to make the voice of God heard above the many voices of the world. While promoting the dialogue of religions, he said, “we should also be prepared to share the life giving message of Jesus, especially because of the alarming growth of secularism and atheism which is a great threat to all religions.”
Cardinal George Alencherry, the head of India-based Syro-Malabar rite Catholic Church, focussed on the universal call to holiness of Christians, saying the Church has to become more and more a communion of persons who have encountered Christ and who pay the cost of discipleship of Christ. The cardinal, who is major Archbishop of Angamaly-Ernakulam, lamented that the lives and ministry of priests and religious have become more functional than spiritual and ecclesial inflamed by the love of Christ. Secularization, he said, has impacted the lives of individual Christians and ecclesial communities. Therefore the New Evangelization calls for empowering individual Christians and Church structures with the dynamism of the Gospel values of truth, justice, love, peace and harmony.
Major Archbishop Baselios Cleemis Thottunkal of Trivandrum, the head of the India-based Syro-Malankara rite Catholic Church, noted that in Asia, where Christians are a minority, the majority non-Christians do not appreciate and acknowledge proclamation and evangelization. In this context what is very effective is the witnessing model – a very practical style of evangelization introduced by Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta. The “witnessing model starts with you and me,” the archbishop said, adding, evangelizers have to make the sacraments a more tangible experience of Christ through profound encounter with God. Christ’s promise of abundant life, he said, must help promote human dignity, bring justice to the underprivileged and the voiceless, and promote democratic values.