Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Bangkok (Agenzia Fides) - “Re-Launching our Evangelizing Mission” is the title of a new publication from the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences (FABC), that contains a documentation of the Asian Mission Congress 2006 in Thailand.
The publication contains reflections that were given over the course of a debate organized by the FABC in India, which focused on the theme of promoting a renewed encounter between the Gospel and the cultures of India, and of the entire continent.
The various reflections offered by Bishops, experts, and theologians all agree on the need to “re-light the missionary fire,” to live an “incarnate spirituality,” and to consider enculturation, i.e. the penetration of the Gospel in the various cultures, as a basic necessity for the Church. In the third millenium, the FABC recalls, the Church in Asia is called to re-launch its mission, insisting that missionary formation is an important commitment for Catholics, as evangelization should be the key element in the ordinary pastoral activity of parishes, associations, and lay movements.
Enculturation, the text says, is a challenge for both the present and future of the Church, as it is a continual process that involves the entire life of a person. It is the process of uniting oneself to God, life, a certain culture, and to human history. It is “an epiphany of the Lord in the heart of a people and a culture, that transforms the heart of man in his attitudes towards God and towards his brothers.” This reality should begin in the family, the starting point for every human and Christian experience. The family is not only the object of the Church’s pastoral care, but it is also the agent of the most effective evangelization. (PA) (Agenzia Fides 28/2/2008, righe 21, parole 283)
