ROLE OF THE CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY: TO ANALYZE THE SOCIETAL SITUATION
“In the face of such widely varying situations, it is difficult for us to utter a unified message and to put forward a solution which has universal validity. This is not our ambition, nor is it our mission. It is up to the Christian communities to analyze with objectivity the situation which is proper to their own country” Pope Paul VI
+++++
In these days before the upcoming Election Day, we recomend that you ponder the following words Pope Francis penned for us in his 2013 Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium (The Joy of the Gospel). In its opening paragraph, he urges the entire Church “to embark on a new chapter of evangelism.” The Church, he says, must understand itself as a “community of missionary disciples”, who are “permanently in a state of mission” because of and filled with the joy of the Gospel. This apostolic exhortation has been described as Pope Francis’ “Magna Carta for church reform.”
Note: We tend to think of the Church as an institution, an organization. This is not so. The Church begun by Jesus is a mystical body of individuals – us, all of us. In our current parish Adult On-Going Formation program, we liken the Church (and our parishioners) to players on a major league baseball team. As it was for the disciples whom Jesus gathered around Him, so that he could shape them into a team to be in a “state of mission”, we are His team, striving to be in this “state of mission”, helping people to sense God’s presence and to join us in being God’s presence in today’s society.
RELIGION AND SOCIETAL AND NATIONAL LIFE
- “No one can demand that religion should be relegated to the inner sanctum of personal life, without influence on societal and national life, without concern for the soundness of civil institutions, without a right to offer an opinion on events affecting society. Who would claim to lock up in a church and silence the message of Saint Francis of Assisi or Blessed Teresa of Calcutta? They themselves would have found this unacceptable. An authentic faith – which is never comfortable or completely personal – always involves a deep desire to change the world, to transmit values, to leave this earth somehow better than we found it. We love this magnificent planet on which God has put us, and we love the human family which dwells here, with all its tragedies and struggles, its hopes and aspirations, its strengths and weaknesses. The earth is our common home and all of us are brothers and sisters. If indeed “the just ordering of society and of the state is a central responsibility of politics”, the Church “cannot and must not remain on the sidelines in the fight for justice”.150 All Christians, their pastors included, are called to show concern for the building of a better world. This is essential, for the Church’s social thought is primarily positive: it offers proposals, it works for change and in this sense it constantly points to the hope born of the loving heart of Jesus Christ. At the same time, it unites “its own commitment to that made in the social field by other Churches and Ecclesial Communities, whether at the level of doctrinal reflection or at the practical level”.151
THE ROLE OF THE CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY
- This is not the time or the place to examine in detail the many grave social questions affecting today’s world, some of which I have dealt with in the second chapter. This Exhortation is not a social document, and for reflection on those different themes we have a most suitable tool in the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, whose use and study I heartily recommend. Furthermore, neither the Pope nor the Church have a monopoly on the interpretation of social realities or the proposal of solutions to contemporary problems. Here I can repeat the insightful observation of Pope Paul VI: “In the face of such widely varying situations, it is difficult for us to utter a unified message and to put forward a solution which has universal validity. This is not our ambition, nor is it our mission. It is up to the Christian communities to analyze with objectivity the situation which is proper to their own country”.152
150 Benedict XVI, Encyclical Letter Deus Caritas Est (25 December 2005), 28: AAS 98 (2006), 239-240.
151 Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church, 12.
152 Paul VI, Apostolic Letter Octogesima Adveniens (14 May 1971), 4: AAS 63 (1971), 403.