THE
P RTAL
December 2012
Page 9
The Ordinary’s Page
Monsignor
Keith Newton writes
As a contribution to the Year of Faith and the New Evangelisation, two
of our priests organised a successful day conference in London last month
entitled ’That All May Be One’. The speakers were Father Aidan Nichols
OP, a great friend of the Ordinariate and a member of the Editorial
Board of this journal, and Father Paul Richardson, who, like us, has
recently entered into the full communion of the Catholic Church though
through the diocesan structures and is now a priest of the Archdiocese of
Westminster.
The New Evangelisation
Both of our speakers encouraged
the Ordinariate to play a vital role in
evangelisation of our country. We
should recognise and rejoice that it
was in this context, of the outward
looking mission of the Church, that
the Ordinariate was established. It
could not be otherwise because the
Church exists to evangelise. It was
William Temple, the Archbishop
of Canterbury during the Second
World War, who said ‘the Church is
the only society on earth that exists
for the benefit of non-members’.
three aspects to evangelisation
The recent Synod of Bishops on the New
Evangelisation for the Transmission of the Christian
Faith, which took place in Rome in October, presented
45 propositions to the Holy Father. There is much there
on which to ponder. The seventh proposition explains
that there are three aspects to evangelisation. There is
the proclamation of the Good News of Jesus Christ to
those who do not know him, directed towards non-
Christians.
There is the evangelisation of those who practice
the Faith; helping and encouraging all to grow in
their faith, both in terms of knowledge and most
importantly in a deepening relationship with the Lord.
Finally, there must be evangelisation towards those
who are baptised but have lapsed from the faith, either
in adult life or who have never had contact with the
Church since infancy. In practice the second of these
must come first, as we will not be able to evangelise
until we ourselves are evangelised and equipped for
the task to which we are called.
many people know
little or nothing of basic
Christian belief
In one sense there is nothing new
in all this, except the context in
which the Church of Jesus Christ is
set in the 21 st Century. We now live
in a country where many people
know little or nothing of basic
Christian belief and where many,
who may describe themselves as
Christian, simply pay lip service to
the Christian Faith which has been
reduced to a moral code for good
behaviour rather than a message of
salvation.
In this country most people are nominally Anglican
but have either drifted away and lost contact with the
Church or never really had any significant contact
other than through the occasional offices of baptism,
marriage and funerals. If we are to respond to the
Church’s call, particularly to the evangelisation of
such people, we need a renewed commitment and
enthusiasm. In addition we need to recognise that it
is often our own sinfulness which prevents many from
exploring the life of faith.
‘universal call to evangelisation’
I hope that this Year of Faith, as well as deepening
the knowledge and personal call for holiness for all
the faithful, will also help us all to recognise that
the call to witness to the faith, by word and deed, is
not for the few but, in the recent words of Cardinal
Timothy Dolan, the Archbishop of New York, there is
a ‘universal call to evangelisation’ as well as a universal
call to holiness. Both are necessary and one will
nurture the other.