INTRODUCTION
New cultural situations, new fields of evangelization
1 « From the time the Gospel was first preached, the Church has known the
process of encounter and engagement with cultures » (Fides et Ratio,
70), for «it is one of the properties of the human person that he can achieve
true and full humanity only by means of culture» (Gaudium et Spes, 53).
In this way, the Good News which is Christ's Gospel for all men and the whole
human person, «both child and parent of the culture in which they are immersed»
(Fides et Ratio, 71), reaches them in their own culture, which absorbs
their manner of living the faith and is in turn gradually shaped by it. «Today,
as the Gospel gradually comes into contact with cultural worlds which once lay
beyond Christian influence, there are new tasks of inculturation» (Ibid.,
72). At the same time, some traditionally Christian cultures or cultures imbued
with thousand-year-old religious traditions are being shattered. Thus, it is
not only a question of grafting the faith onto these cultures, but also of
revitalizing a de-Christianized world whose only Christian references are of a
cultural nature. On the threshold of the Third Millennium, the Church
throughout the world is faced with new cultural situations, new fields of
evangelization.
Faced with the challenges of «our times [which] are both momentous and
fascinating» (Redemptoris Missio, 38), the Pontifical Council for
Culture would like to share some convictions and practical suggestions. They
are the result of several exchanges on a renewed pastoral approach to culture;
thanks particularly to fruitful collaboration with Bishops, as diocesan
pastors, and their co-workers in this field of apostolic work as a privileged
point of encounter with Christ's message. For all culture «is an effort to
ponder the mystery of the world and in particular of the human person: it is a
way of giving expression to the transcendent dimension of human life. The heart
of every culture is its approach to the greatest mystery: the mystery of
God»(1) The decisive challenge of a pastoral approach to culture, for
«a faith that does not become culture is a faith not fully accepted, not
entirely thought out, not faithfully lived».(2)
The suggestions offered respect Pope John Paul II's urgent request to the
Pontifical Council for Culture: «You must help the Church to respond to these
fundamental questions for the cultures of today: how is the message of the
Church accessible to the new cultures, to contemporary forms of understanding
and of sensitivity? How can the Church of Christ make itself understood by the
modern spirit, so proud of its achievements and at the same time so uneasy for
the future of the human family?».(3)
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