Cardinal Braz de Aviz on religious and evangelization
A new and comprehensible language
to make Christ known
In a secularized world in which the new generations in particular lack a
personal experience of God and are “religiously
illiterate”,
the best way to proclaim the Gospel is to show God tangibly and clearly in ways
that do not demand an expensive and difficult initiation. In this regard the
communion among consecrated people is exemplary, because it testifies to the
possibility of “giving those who are distant a sample of the experience of
God”. Cardinal João Braz de Aviz, Prefect of the Congregation for Institutes of
Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, is convinced of this. He
therefore made it the theme of the discourse on “Communion and evangelization”,
which he gave to a large gathering of consecrated people in Madrid, in the
context of this past Week of Religious Life.
Communion, he explained, makes it possible “to give visibility to the salvation we proclaim” and enables us to show God “while respecting the needs of 'secularism', and without using directly religious resources or means. And this is crucial for both indirect and direct pastoral care”.
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