Bishop Aguer : The Catholic community in Mongolia is minuscule, numbering 1,500 faithful, which suggests that the country has not really been deeply evangelized.
The presence there of the Successor of Peter presented an excellent opportunity: was it not possible, perhaps, to announce the name of Jesus Christ, with respect and cordiality towards the Buddhist listeners, and to present himself not as the bearer of a humanistic message but as what he is, the Vicar of Christ?
Unfortunately, the Pope’s trips are not evangelizing gestures but vaguely religious ones; the proclamation of the kerygma, as befits the apostolic office, is not primarily to be found in them.
This time it was a sermon against fundamentalism: “Closed-mindedness, unilateral imposition, fundamentalism and ideological coercion ruin fraternity, feed tensions and endanger peace.”
St. Paul’s discourse in the Areopagus of Athens (Acts 17:22-31) is a model that analogically can be applied today to the relationship of Catholic …More