This is from Facebook, Sherry Weddell talking about evangelization.
From Archbishop Anthony Fisher of Sydney comes some witty observations about the Fifth Plenary Council that is taking place in Australia right now.
"In Monty Python’s Life of Brian, Reg, a member of the People’s Liberation Front of Judea, asks rhetorically, ‘What have the Romans ever done for us?’ To his frustration his fellows respond with multiple examples of the benefits of Roman civilisation.
‘All right, all right,’ Reg concedes, ‘but apart from sanitation, medicine, education, wine, public order, irrigation, roads, a freshwater system, and public health, what have the Romans ever done for us?’
Something similar might be said about Australia’s indebtedness to Christianity generally and especially the Catholic Church.
“All right, all right, but apart from a few obvious saints, and many hidden ones; or inventing the university and providing primary and secondary schools worldwide; or running orphanages, aged care, feeding stations and other welfare; or creating and maintaining hospitals, hospices and clinics…
“Apart from contributions to language and law, conceptions of justice and human rights; to ending cannibalism, slavery, infanticide and the chattel conception of women and children; to the advent of the scientific method and much subsequent science, medicine and technology; to the heritage of Christian art, architecture, literature and music; and to the theological and philosophical ideas underpinning our democracy and so much else; and to the sublime moral code and vision of the person that still inspire so many…
“Apart from all that,” Secular Modernity asks, “what have the Catholics ever done for us?”
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"None of which makes the Catholic Church perfect. The child sexual abuse crisis, spotlighted by the Royal Commission, left young ones terribly damaged, others understandably disillusioned, the Church’s credibility shot. Try as it may to bring justice and healing to survivors and to ensure this terrible chapter is never repeated, the Church will not regain some people’s trust for years—if ever.
We could identify other failings . The ancient adage “Ecclesia semper reformanda”—the Church always needing renewal—highlights that however divine the founder, the message or the graces received, we can always do better."
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"Australia would be the poorer without the Catholic Church. So the Church must renew itself, recover its founding inspiration and purge itself of the causes of its failures. It must address people’s deepest needs, state with confidence its faith and morals, find a language that speaks today, and so build people up in faith, hope and love.
The Church will serve the culture best, as well as its own members, by being its best self, faithful to the mission given by Christ — not by re-inventing itself as a secular NGO."
FYI, Fisher's concluding sentence about survival as an NGO is a reference to a common assumption that the Catholic Church in Australia will survive primarily through its large, effective, and well-heeled-because-state-funded network of schools (attended by 20% of Aussie students), hospitals and other social services - while local parish communities which are small (by US standards), and relatively poor would disappear. Because the assumption of many high secularized Aussies is that believing Catholics are rather like dinosaurs and passing away.
FYI, Fisher's concluding sentence about survival as an NGO is a reference to a common assumption that the Catholic Church in Australia will survive primarily through its large, effective, and well-heeled-because-state-funded network of schools (attended by 20% of Aussie students), hospitals and other social services - while local parish communities which are small (by US standards), and relatively poor would disappear. Because the assumption of many high secularized Aussies is that believing Catholics are rather like dinosaurs and passing away.
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