Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Pope Makes Plans to "Re-Evangelize" the West; Says Europe Is Decaying to a Secular Society

Pope Benedict XVI is creating a new Vatican office to fight secularization and "re-evangelize" the West -- a tacit acknowledgment that his attempts to reinvigorate Christianity in Europe have not succeeded and need a new boost. Benedict announced the new office during a vespers' service yesterday (June 28, 2010), according to the Huffington Post website.

Benedict said that in Europe -- where Christianity has existed for centuries -- "the process of secularization has produced a serious crisis of the sense of the Christian faith and role of the Church."

The new pontifical council, he said, would "promote a renewed evangelization" in countries where the Church has long existed "but which are living a progressive secularization of society and a sort of 'eclipse of the sense of God.'"

Benedict did not say who would head the new office, but Italian media have said he will select Monsignor Rino Fisichella, who as head of the Pontifical Academy for Life, is the Vatican's top bioethics official.

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