Vatican conference focuses on church's new missionary challenges

Published: 2003-10-20

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The Third World shift of the Catholic Church and the future of its missionary efforts drew attention from cardinals and bishops gathered to discuss the first 25 years of Pope John Paul II's pontificate. At the closing session of a Vatican conference Oct. 18, Cardinal Ivan Dias of Mumbai, India, outlined the evangelization picture since the pope's election in 1978, noting the church's strong growth in new areas like Africa and Asia and its slippage in places like Europe. Cardinal Dias said church leaders need to reflect on missionary plans at a time when "the winds of secularization and globalization are blowing ever strongly all over the world and threaten to invade the sacred precincts of the church itself." He said, "Indeed, Europe is now one of those traditionally Christian places which, in addition to a new evangelization, require in some cases a first evangelization."

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