Fr Dwight Longenecker on Sacramentalized but Not Evangelized Catholics

By Fr Dwight Longenecker
11/3/2012
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

This is how the New Evangelization will take place--just like the old evangelization--by lives on fire--lives transformed by an encounter with Christ the Lord.

Many of the Catholics I meet are sacramentalized, and many of them are fairly well catechized. They have yet to be evangelized. "Evangel" is another word for the gospel, and the gospel is another word for Good News. So, in other words, many Catholics have yet to really hear with the ear of their hearts the Good News of Jesus Christ.

Fr Dwight Longenecker

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GREENVILLE, SC (Catholic Online) - Every Saturday night I found myself in a different presbytery somewhere in England. I was working for a Catholic charity making mission appeals, and it was my job to visit the parishes and speak about our work. After the vigil Mass the priest and I would retire to the presbytery for supper and a glass of something to lubricate the conversation.

Many of the priests were good, solid Irishmen who had come to England to minister. They were always interested in my unusual trek from America to England, and through the Anglican church to the Catholic faith.

Often they spoke well of their Protestant neighbors and colleagues. They admired and respected the godly Protestants they knew. They also understood that many Protestants had a different sort of relationship with Christ than many Catholics. We would discuss this difference and one priest summed it up. "The problem with many Catholics is that they are sacramentalized but not evangelized."

He explained that in Ireland when he was growing up the whole population were Catholic. Everyone had to be baptized. Crowds of children had to be educated and prepared for first Holy Communion. Crowds more had to be prepared for confirmation, then for marriage or ordination or service in the many religious orders. "We had to put 'em through on a conveyor belt!" he explained. They came out the other side having memorized a penny catechism and with a list of do's and don'ts and the assurance that if they kept their nose clean they might just make it into purgatory."

The problem I find now that I am a Catholic priest is that this Irish priest's explanation is true here in the United States too. There was a culture here of "putting them through on a conveyor belt." It's assembly line Catholicism. The result is a population of Catholics who think their religion is a matter of going through the actions, keeping the rules and regulations and the most important thing is not missing Mass on Sunday. What many of them don't seem to 'get' is that this is the minimum not the maximum. The Catholic faith is far more than minding your Ps and Qs and hoping you'll scrape by and make it into purgatory.

Pope Benedict XVI keeps reminding us in his gentle way that the Christian faith is not primarily about rules and regulations or even dogma and set devotions, but it is about an encounter with Christ. He almost sounds like Billy Graham asking people to "invite Jesus Christ into their lives as their personal Lord and Savior"! In fact, if Billy Graham and Pope Benedict could sit down for breakfast one morning (I'm sure they'd eat eggs Benedict.) they would have many points of agreement.

The entire history of salvation is about real human beings having an encounter with God--an encounter that changes their lives and ultimately changes the world. Throughout the Old Testament the stories echo of the astounding and life changing encounters between God and his chosen people. The gospels are nothing if they are not the record of the profound and moving encounters between needy people and the God who meets them where they are.

This Good News is proclaimed most readily by those who live the gospel day by day in a radical way. If we live out what we say we believe, others will also see that we have encountered Christ. They will sense that we live life in a new and greater dimension, and seeing the transformation in us they will search for that same new life.

This is how the New Evangelization will take place--just like the old evangelization--by lives on fire--lives transformed by an encounter with Christ the Lord.

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Fr Dwight Longenecker's latest book Catholicism Pure and Simple is a powerful and clear explanation of the Catholic faith starting with arguments for God and leading to Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit, the Church, sacraments and spirituality. Check out his website, blog and free weekly newsletter.

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Pope Benedict XVI's Prayer Intentions for January 2013
General Intention: The Faith of Christians. That in this Year of Faith Christians may deepen their knowledge of the mystery of Christ and witness joyfully to the gift of faith in him.
Missionary Intention: Middle Eastern Christians. That the Christian communities of the Middle East, often discriminated against, may receive from the Holy Spirit the strength of fidelity and perseverance.

Keywords: Fr Dwight Longenecker, New Evangelization, year of Faith, Encounter, sacramentalized, evangelization, Good news

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1 - 8 of 8 Comments

AC
7 months ago
John Kippley writes to his instructors , for his book: "Natural Family Planning, The Complete Approach, " that the task for teachers is to place the whole issue of birth regulation in the context of Christian discipleship. This is so crucial because then, it become a closer look at oneself versus a "me-and-the-magisterium" issue. It is frightening how few have this relationship with Jesus.
Carole
7 months ago
Outstanding. Well said. And, what was the video you meant to post? I can't make it play anything.
Carole
7 months ago
Outstanding. Well said.
Emma
7 months ago
Two yrs ago, as a student of the Wiccan Faith, I studied more scripture, Catholic Teachings and religious history than most Christians (yes, even the Catechism and Vatican II Documents) . It wasn't until I came to know Christ on a personal level through His people, living examples of Love in action: it wasn't until I personally encountered Him that I "got it ". If we speak God's Word with power revealing all Its Mysteries, but have not Love, we are nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate. " There are so many now "evangelizing" who speak with great authority, great knowledge, who have not yet had that personal encounter, thus turning many away with their hypocrisy. Those searching for the Love of God more frequently than not are capable of searching out the written words, it's the Love of God that we, His Children are called to witness to.......not only with our word's, but with our lives. "Thy Kingdom Come. Thy Will be done.....on earth. "
Andrew M. Greenwell
7 months ago
Yup: It's one grand recipe, and we want the whole works: evangelized, catechized, sacramentalized, liturgized, virtuous and pneumatological, ecclesiastical, and sanctified disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ!
Laura
7 months ago
This is such an interesting observation, I was first introduced to this concept because its just what Peter Kreeft writes about in his book Jesus Shock too.
Thanks and God bless!
Bill Sr.
7 months ago
LOVES ANOINTED…SAINTS ALIVE!
It is imperative that we believe in God. It is wonderful that we believe in Angels. And it is a blessing that we believe in Saints. Good! Well, just who and where are the saints?
It is sad to know that many “Christians” either dismiss entirely the notion of sainthood or find it difficult to incorporate into their spiritual life the communion of saints and the value they are to the universal Christian church. I don’t know that you can be Christian and not believe that the human soul is eternal. If it is eternal then its “status” in life and after death, especially to those who know and love the person, becomes an important concern.
We can agree that this life of ours is but for a season and how we live and share it with others is of eternal consequence for the body and soul which envelops it. This is why it is so important that as parents we honor our obligation to instill deeply within the hearts and minds of our children those very first two rules of the catechism “to know and to love God”. Children without a true understanding of their heavenly father and why they were created have little hope to perform the third rule of Christian life, “to serve Him”. Hopefully we can see to it our little children develop the perspective that life here is like a playground where we sinners can train ourselves to become saints. The games or activities designed for us require only active loving participation and service at all times and a willingness to assist anyone needing help achieving the goals our heavenly Father has for us.
As grown ups we become so entrenched in our often drab day to day existence by the requirements of producing and providing that we forget that we too are children, God’s children. We look at our children playing and think of how worry free they are since we have taken on all their cares for them. We forget that “Our Father” through the Holy Spirit has lovingly provided our Lord Jesus who invites us to place our cares and worries upon him so that we too enjoy freedom to become children of God, His “saints”. It has been said that a saint is someone who deep within his heart believes God loves him and offers him eternal life through Christ’s sacrifice and resurrection and desires to use their life to witness, inform and assure others of the same truth about themselves. It’s that simple.
So, who are the saints? They are people like you and me who believe and hope in their Creator and begin their heaven here on earth living Christ’s prayerful request by helping build “thy kingdom come, on earth as it is in heaven”. We all have an “invitation” to sainthood and can respond according to our own abilities, gifts, and station in life willingly in the name of Jesus who relieves our burdens and has freed our spirits to be among the saints. Hopefully many of us will be among that “great number which no man could count” spoken of in Revelations which will eternally be the “communion of saints”.
Father God, we pray that we can rejoice fully in the world as children of light and holiness so men can witness and know the truth of your merciful love and accept Jesus as their “personal” savior through and within the eternal “one body of Christ”.
Yes, all are “personally” welcomed to the community of saints, here, now, and forever!
Bill Sr.
abey
7 months ago
Understanding the Sacraments is to Evangelize the Oracles of God, which Evangelization arises from knowing His truth through the revelations of the Spirit, in the way of the Apostles, in Christ, which is also to discern falseness like the Oracle of Delphi encountered by Apostle Paul to the "Divination" of the divining woman which is but to "Occultism through the Sorcery" & freeing her of this ill.

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