Bringing Parishes to Evangelize

20-09-2008

LONDON, SEPT. 19, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Parishes should become an evangelizing force, say the bishops of England and Wales, and they are providing tools to parishes so this challenge can be reached.

Part of the initiative is this Sunday's celebration of Home Mission Sunday, a day of prayer for the spread of the Gospel in England and Wales.

Bishop Malcolm McMahon, chair of the episcopal conference's Department for Evangelization and Catechesis, said that "as a Catholic Community, we need to be supported and equipped to enable us to be effective evangelizers."

To that end, every parish has been sent a DVD and regional evangelization training days will be offered from January to April, 2009. The DVD covers areas such as mission inside and outside the parish, to the youth, evangelization by serving the poor and in the power of the Holy Spirit.

"The hope is that this year every member of the Catholic community will grow in awareness that they have a job for life -- to evangelize -- which is both their duty but also a life-giving and freeing activity," said a statement from the organizers. "The Church teaches that the task of evangelization is not something which burdens but frees."

Peace

This Sunday is also the World Day of Prayer for Peace, an initiative instituted at the United Nations in 1981.

The resolution invites all member states, institutions, nongovernmental organizations and citizens to participate. The initiative is based in the United States, where some 140 congregations of various confessions have organized public prayer meetings. Nine other countries are uniting in a 24-hour uninterrupted prayer chain.

http://www.zenit.org/article-23665?l=english