Is Evangelization inherently in Conflict?

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alphonsus1

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What is the most effective mode of evangelization?

(A) Emphasize “God loves you more than you can imagine. You are a beloved child of God”

(B) Emphasize “Flee from sin. Flee from sin. Flee from sin.”

Both are True, but is emphasizing love and mercy (a Pope Francis Catholicism) most optimal for evangelization? Or is it high moral standards that take constant vigilance to live up to that is most optimal? Is what is most optimal at getting people to agree with the Church’s teachings (that is, having the largest number of people in agreement with the Magesterium) at odds with what is most optimal for evangelization (that is, having the largest number of people attending mass/ calling themselves Catholic)?
 
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Mileage may vary. One has to know his audience. For some people, hearing a message of love and consolation is probably going to resonate better. For others, hearing a message of the urgent need to turn from sin might resonate better. And for some people, things need to be rationally laid out and explained and taken apart so they’ll get why they should believe it or why it’s important to believe it.

It really all depends. I’ve been assigned to seven parishes–three as a priest and four as a seminarian, and every single one of them was different, and thus required a different pastoral approach.

-Fr ACEGC
 
alphonsus1 said:
What is the most effective mode of evangelization?

(A) Emphasize “God loves you more than you can imagine. You are a beloved child of God”

(B) Emphasize “Flee from sin. Flee from sin. Flee from sin.”
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Neither. The best mode is to live your life in full accordance with the Gospels so that others will want to emulate you, and Christ. Actions talk a lot louder than words.
 
Certainly, but I would say it’s not an either/or, but a both/and. The two are not mutually exclusive, and one requires the other. I must live so that my preaching is authentic, and I must preach what it is I aim to live. They say that the best homilies are the ones we give ourselves, after all.
 
I love your thoughts. So let me press you on that.

I have thought a lot about time, place, person, and what you can and cannot say? Is there a way to know what will resonate the best with your audience, or do you just have to get to know the individual better?

For example, I sent a good friend a sermon of St. Alphonsus titled: “The Delusion of Sinners.” He described it as “powerful.” But other people may be turned away by these sermons. So how do you know if they will be a person that responds best to “flee from sin” or “God loves you” or “rational argumentation.”
 
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First off, I wouldn’t put it in such rigid categories as all of those, since there can be as many approaches to communicating the Gospel as there are people trying to communicate it and people to whom it is to be communicated. Those are just some general approaches, but it could vary greatly.

Second, I think you’re onto it when you say you have to know the person, and you also have to know yourself. There are things I can say to some people because I am a priest, that if anyone else said them to them, they wouldn’t resonate. Just the same, there are people who won’t listen to me because I’m a priest. So you have to use your prudent judgment to determine what’s going to be the most effective way for you to communicate, and what’s most likely to reach the target.
 
I would ask a followup.

Can you give a concrete example of struggles that you’ve had with evangelization? I am currently a grad student and to tell you the Truth, I never talk about sin to people. It is all about God’s love. Do you think that starting with a message of love is best? And then moving to give them “nuggets” of Catholic morality as they are more likely to be receptive to it is best? What do you do to people who disagree with Catholic morality… it is definitely better to keep people in the Church at all costs, because if they leave, then it will be incredibly hard to evangelize to their kids who won’t be exposed to rituals… they will think of it all as “weird.”

Should the Church move away from emphasizing “pelvic issues” (abortion, contraception, sexual morality)?
 
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Well it depends on whether that message drives people away from the Church. If people leave the Church, they also won’t follow Catholic morality. My friends are atheist/nonreligious, and they sure do not follow Catholic morality.

Is it worth having a country where 20 percent of the US calls themselves Catholic, but perhaps 5 percent of the US follows its morality?

Or a country where 5 percent of the US call themselves Catholic and all 5 percent follow Catholic morality?
 
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alphonsus1 said:
I never talk about sin to people. It is all about God’s love. Do you think that starting with a message of love is best?
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There is no conflict between talking about sin and talking about God’s love. The two are not mutually exclusive.

Think of sin as a sickness or injury of the soul. If someone in your family were sick, you wouldn’t say “Oh, that’s wonderful! I support you being sick!” You would help them find medicine or a doctor. Confession is where we meet the Divine Physician. God’s grace is the medicine.

The Church should never move away from emphasizing any moral issues. They have to be preached in such a way that it will be effective, and again, on this, mileage may vary. People will disagree. People will be unreasonable. People will walk away. But if you sell them a cheap truth that’s watered down so that they will not walk away, then they have not talked to the truth. If you teach them the real truth, and they walk away, that’s on them.

I would say it’s not “better to keep them in the Church at all costs,” because if they’re not really united to the truth–if their hearts aren’t in it–then they aren’t served by being in the Church. They aren’t living authentically. You can’t claim to be something you are not, or live one way when what you identify as ought to live in another. If people abandon truth because it’s difficult or walk away because it’s “weird,” that’s on them. We do them no favors by selling out on the truth.

That said, though, it is about finding ways to reach people, and this is something that you just have to discern and put in God’s hands when you’re presented with the opportunity.
 
alphonsus1 said:
Is it worth having a country where 20 percent of the US calls themselves Catholic, but perhaps 5 percent of the US follows its morality?

Or a country where 5 percent of the US call themselves Catholic and all 5 percent follow Catholic morality?
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In the former case, 15 percent of that country are living a lie. Would you rather have a small number of people living authentically, or a large number of people living a lie? And if you have a lot of people living a lie, then more and more people will buy into the idea that it’s okay to live a lie. That’s the definition of scandal, to lead someone into sin. The reason a large number of people nowadays reject Catholic morality isn’t that they’ve thought it through and decided that the Church is wrong, it’s that they know that a large number of people reject it, and they’re going along with the herd.
 
I do not think there is a conflict in Truth, but I do not know for sure if there is a conflict in “keeping people in the Church.”

(1) For your doctor comparison, failing to state the Truth is perhaps a sin of omission but it is not “I support you being sick” … because you might oppose something, but not emphasize it. What we are discussing are sins of omission, when is it an omission to state or not state the Truth, but you could have said something differently. I support every single letter of Catholic morality. I am asking when it is, and is not prudent to emphasize it. So here is what I should have said: “Stop explicitly emphasizing sin to such a high degree… and go with Pope Francis’s change in tone” (Pope Francis talks about sin, just not as frequently as some people wish).

(2) “If you teach them the real truth, and they walk away, that’s on them.” Yes, but would it be better to just keep them in the pews, because if they walk away, how will we ever get their kids into the Church?

(3) What is a better way to advertise Catholic morality? Because whatever our chastity speakers are doing now, it is utterly failing!

(4) MOST IMPORTANT: What I meant when I said “weird” was that … to someone who has never seen Catholic rituals before, the mass could look “weird.” That is why I think if we lose an entire generation of Catholics whose parents do not raise them in the Faith, it will be hard to evangelize to their kids! Basically, what I am saying is that the kids of people who walk away from the Faith will be essential atheists. They will get the same reaction as I got when I saw Muslims praying… I subconsciously thought “look at them shrieking on the quad” … this is the same reactions atheists will get to seeing the Catholic mass… this is where the insults like “Catholics dress up for Halloween” come from. All I am saying is that I have this bit of intuition (I don’t know if its correct) deep down that is saying “keep people in the Faith at all costs.” Because I just think it will be incredibly hard to evangelize to atheists/ the kids of people who leave the Faith! Thoughts?
 
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I would rather have a large number of people living a lie, but still in the Faith, than a small number of people living the Truth, and everyone else being non-Catholic so likely also living a lie… because if those same people that are right now “living a lie”… decide to leave the Faith… they will be atheists and still “living a lie” it is just worse because they won’t be in Church on top of still living the immoral life. And like I said before, I don’t know how this all interacts with evangelization to the kids of people driven away from the Faith. Their kids could very well be “gone, gone” as in “it will be extremely hard to bring them to the Faith.”

Also, the “small number living the Truth” will still be small in either scenario.

5% living the Truths + 15% not living it (but at least they are Catholic) + 80% not Catholic and mostly not living it.
vs… your preference…
5% living the Truths + 95% not Catholic and mostly not living it.
 
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alphonsus1 said:
(3) What is a better way to advertise Catholic morality? Because whatever our chastity speakers are doing now, it is utterly failing!
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It’s doing a lot worse than failing.

There is a Evangelic Protestant firm called Barna that monitors opinion on Christianity both within the Church and in broader society. They found that the number one word that non-Christians associate with Christianity is “anti-LGBT”, which is hardly surprising. They also found that that is the number one word that younger Christians also associate with Christianity.

I would be very surprised if the situation was any different in regards to the Catholic Church.

There was a time when even non-Christians associated the word “Catholic” with schools, hospitals and universities. A lot now associate it with “homophobia, misogyny and pedophilia”.

You are right that we have to foster a positive image for our “brand”. A lot of people will blame the media for the damage to our “brand”, but, in reality, much if not most was self-inflicted.
 
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Catholics must go into the ‘highways and byways.’ We must preach the Gospel. Romans 10:14

New International Version
“How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?”

Get pamphlets/tracts and offer them to others. Go in groups.

Catholic Tracts

Our Catholic tracts have led thousands back to the Church. Use these tracts today to gain deeper insights and answers into crucial Catholic topics.
www.catholic.com www.catholic.com
 
I will take a look. I am actually a statistics masters student. So I am very familiar with study design and causal inference. I have looked at claims that more liberal Christian denominations are shrinking faster than more conservative ones. There are two theories for this (this should be a subject of a future post).

(1) Do more conservative denominations teach Truths that take constant vigilance to live out… so the high moral standards themselves are just inherently better at keeping people in the Faith… this is the “people go to Church to get a message different than what society teaches argument.”

(2) Are people weaker in the Faith from the start… just more attracted to liberal denominations to begin with. So those liberal denominations would shrink at the same rate or higher, even if they changed to conservative messaging.

I am trying to figure out what the Truth is, and it could be a combination of different theories!
 
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Yes, I will take a look if I get a chance. And the answer to this could be very complicated. It could be that overall on a macro-scale we need to change our tone, but on a micro-scale we could have different priests who emphasize different things. And then for each priest we have to think about time/place/person, to say Truths at the right time… because there are so many Truths that you cannot say all of them at once… so you may start with easy ones… and then build up to more difficult Truths.

One last question. I am helping plan a grad student retreat. What would be the best way that would draw people into the Faith… after the retreat has ended… that is, keep people engaged not just for the retreat… but for after the retreat.

Prayer buddies/ accountability? Offering to give people rides to daily mass? Other ideas?
 
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alphonsus1 said:
So how do you know if they will be a person that responds best to “flee from sin” or “God loves you” or “rational argumentation.”
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Knowing your audience is the first step to evangelization. It doesn’t do any good to preach AT someone. What do they need? What do they already know and what do they need to hear?
 
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