Movements, a “New Springtime

in the Church”

The Zenit News Agency (www.zenit.org) which is based in Rome, Italy produces in multiple languages: The World Seen from Rome. Their reports, which are also available by electronic mail, are very informative and have captured the significance that John Paul II places on movements, communities and apostolates in the Church and the important mission that he calls them to carry out. The following is quoted from the May 31, 1998 Zenit Weekly Report:

MOVEMENTS, A "NEW SPRINGTIME IN THE CHURCH" Pope John Paul II Offers Enthusiastic Support for New Forms of Apostolate

VATICAN CITY, MAY 31, (ZENIT) ‑ Future Church historians will have to distinguish between "before" and "after" Pentecost 1998. In fact, this celebration, with all its profound and suggestive moments, has served as the occasion for the Pope to publicly recognize the "coming of age" of new Movements, communities, and ecclesial realities of Christian living that have blossomed in the wake of Vatican II.

The unanticipated turnout powerfully confirmed the historic importance of the event. Modern Rome has never experienced such a massive gathering for such an occasion. Before this immense assembly of 300,000, which overflowed St Peter's Square and practically filled the nearby streets all the way down to the Tiber River, John Paul pointed out that Aafter 2,000 years of Christianity, the inexhaustible fruitfulness of the Spirit is always active and evokes a new springtime in the Church.@ The Papal message was obvious: The more than 50 Movements represented at the encounter, among others, Communion and Liberation, Regnum Christi, Focolare, Christian Life Movement (MVC), Charismatic Renewal, The Neocatecumenal Way, Schönstatt, Cursillos, Legion of Mary, Emmanuel Community, etc., must reach maturity. They certainly were not the result of any overarching pastoral plan, and at times they have provoked certain tensions, but nevertheless, they are a clear witness to the action of the Holy Spirit on the threshold of the third millennium.

AMovements, new communities, providential expressions of the new springtime brought about by the spirit of the Second Vatican Council,@ the Pope added, Aare a manifestation of the power of the God's love, who, overcoming all divisions and barriers of every kind, renews the face of the earth in order to build the civilization of love.@

John Paul called the Movements to become the leading protagonists of the new evangelization in the midst of a materialistic world: AIn the Christian formation offered by your Movements, never forget to include the element of faithful obedience to bishops, the successors of the apostles, in communion with the Successor of Peter.@

In the homily the next day during the Mass of Pentecost celebrated in St Peter's Square, the Pope likened the atmosphere of Saturday's vigil to Athat of the first Pentecost where the apostles experienced the encounter of their own human spirit with the Holy Spirit. An extraordinary experience still present in the Church was born at that moment and accompanies her throughout the centuries, helping all the faithful to discover the meaning of their own destiny, of their earthly existence, and even of the relationship between life and death.@

Regardless of many sociologists' predictions to the contrary, the Catholic Church at the end of this century is showing an unexpected strength of public witness. The evangelizing renewal that these Movements may bring will depend both upon whether they follow the Pope's advice and are able to work together effectively with the bishops and local churches and, at the same time, whether the bishops respect the Movements' particular charisms. [Zenit, 1998, 5/31/99 Weekly Report]

Guzmán Carriquiry, Subsecretary of the Pontifical Council for the Laity, the married lay person with the greatest level of responsibility in the Vatican, explained the significance of this event:

AThis encounter was born out of an express desire of the Holy Father,@ he explained. AIt is practically a personal convocation, which he made on the vigil of Pentecost of 1996.@ [Ibid]

AThe Pope has detected in the ecclesial Movements one of the signs of the 'springtime' announced by the [Second Vatican] Council, a great gift of the Spirit to the Church of our time, a springtime that has also passed through cold moments and which may again bloom with an eruption of gifts and charisms of the Spirit. The Holy Father finds various fundamental aspects for the whole Church in the Movements: he notes that in them, there is a renewed encounter and following of Jesus Christ, an experience and consciousness of belonging to the Church as a mystery of communion, a faithfulness and responsibility for the truths transmitted by the Church in her Tradition, and an impulse to go to meet man in his needs, desires, and hopes.@ [Ibid]

On this World Congress in Rome, the Holy Father wrote:

A... since the beginning of my Pontificate, I have attributed great importance to the path of the ecclesial Movements, and I have been able to appreciate the fruits of their widespread and growing presence in my pastoral visits to parishes and my apostolic trips. I have noted with satisfaction their willingness to put their own energies at the service of the See of Peter and of the local churches. I have noted them as a novelty that has not yet been accepted and valued adequately. Today I note, and for this I am happy, a more mature self‑awareness. You represent one of the most significant fruits of this springtime of the Church foretold by the Second Vatican Council, but you often unfortunately are blocked by the extended process of secularization. Your presence is encouraging, since it shows that this springtime is moving forward, showing the freshness of the Christian experience, based on a personal encounter with Christ.@ [Ibid]

In May 1999, The Apostolate of the New Evangelization became one of these official movements in the Church.