Pope Francis has described secularisation as a “complex phenomenon” and how the Church must “confront forms of paganism” within it.
His comments have come to light following his 28 September meeting with 150 of his brother Jesuits in Brussels, Belgium – one of Europe’s most secular and aggressively progressive countries – during which the pontiff answered a question from a Jesuit member living in Amsterdam, one of the most secularised cities in the world, reports Crux.
In his reply, which were published in La Civiltà Cattolica on 8 October, Francis noted that he didn’t mean a paganism like the one found in the ancient world, explaining:
“We do not need a statue of a pagan god to talk about paganism,” the Pope said. “The very environment, the air we breathe is a gaseous pagan god! And we must preach to this culture in terms of witness, service and faith. And from within we must do it with prayer.”
“There is no need to think of very sophisticated things; think of St. Paul in Athens,” the Pope continued, giving the example of how Paul went to Greece and preached in Athens, pointing out to the locals their ignorance of the true God and their worship of idols.
At the time, Athens was a city steeped in pagan culture and philosophy, while the Athenians were proud of their city’s cultural and intellectual achievements. Paul’s message was met with skepticism and even hostility; however, some Athenians did follow Paul’s preaching, and the city eventually became a significant centre for early Christianity.
In making his comments, the Pope may have been thinking of the situation surrounding him in Italy these days. A startling number of lapsed Catholics in Italy are reverting to the deities of ancient Rome and turning to pagan seers, astrologers and psychics, attesting to a potentially catastrophic collapse of Catholicism in its traditional bastion.
Over 160,000 sorcerers are doing brisk business in the occult and New Age practises, with over three million Italians consulting the so-called “maghi” every year for advice. This involves shelling out an astronomical €8 billion, according to data from the Osservatorio Antiplagio.
Between 10 to 13 million Italians – almost all of them baptised Catholics – have turned to sorcerers or witches at least once in their lives; while 30,000 Italians from all classes of society seek out psychics and visionaries daily, in a quest for a better future, the Codacons agency states.
The epicentre of witchcraft and occultism is in the Lombardy region of northern Italy, with 2,800 occult operators and 200,000 clients – numbers that far exceed the percentages of resident Catholic priests and Catholics who attend Holy Mass on a weekly basis.
A survey conducted in 2023 by the market research company SWG found that 34 per cent of Italians believe or engage in necromancy, 24 per cent in black magic, 19 per cent in predicting the future with cards, 18 per cent in white magic, and 17 per cent in psychic or occultic healers.
Read the rest: https://catholicherald.co.uk/pope-francis-says-church-must-confront-pagan-elements-of-secularism/
No comments:
Post a Comment