Steve Stands 🇺🇲

Well, another Cardinal has come out with a, shall we say, puzzling take on evangelization. A few years ago, Cardinal Américo Aguiar, at the time auxiliary bishop of Lisbon, said that he and the other organizers of World Youth Day in his hometown had no interest in converting anyone to Christ. Now Cardinal Jean-Paul Vesco of Algeria has opined that “the Church is not there to convert” and “Christians should approach other religions through fraternity rather than seeking conversions.” Excuse me, but…what? Last time I checked, the Founder said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.” Sure sounds like conversion to me. When St. Paul came to Corinth or Athens or Thessalonica, his purpose was not to listen or to form a discussion group but rather to declare an unnerving message: the euangelion (glad tidings) that Jesus Christ is risen from the dead. So impassioned is he for this work that he says, “I have become all things to all people, that I might by all means save some. I do it all for the sake of the gospel” (1 Cor. 9:22); and “If I proclaim the gospel, this gives me no ground for boasting, for an obligation is laid on me, and woe to me if I do not proclaim the gospel” (1 Cor. 9:16)! Moreover, the entire thrust of the Second Vatican Council was toward bringing the Light of Christ to the peoples of the world (Lumen Gentium). And this missionary élan has given rise in the last few decades to the idea of a “new evangelization,” which is to say, a fresh declaration of the Lordship of Christ. Quite obviously, no one thinks that this work of evangelization should be done in a brow-beating, overbearing, or disrespectful manner (proselytization), but for God’s sake, let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater. If I really thought that the Church does not exist to bring people to Christ, then I would resign and get an honest job.

Friends, in just two days, Christians were murdered on two continents. On Friday, gunmen opened fire on a funeral at St. George’s Greek Orthodox Church in Karak, Jordan, and killed nine people. On Saturday, armed men attacked Orthodox churches and homes in Oromia, Ethiopia, and killed more than forty. These are not statistics. They are our brothers and sisters, members of the mystical Body of Christ. When Saul set out to destroy the Church, the risen Jesus asked him, “Why are you persecuting me?” The Lord is still being persecuted in these victims of anti-Christian violence. Christianity is by far the most persecuted religion in the world today. Those of us who worship in comfort have to ask what the deaths of these martyrs demand of us. At the very least, they demand that we pray for them, learn their names, press our leaders to act, and refuse to look away. The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.