Catholics need to wake up when it comes to politics, and stop leaving “God in the pew,” says a Vatican aide.<\/p>\n
Bishop Giampaolo Crepaldi, secretary of the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace, said this today when he addressed a conference organized by Retinopera, a network of Italian organizations that promote the Church\u2019s social teachings.<\/p>\n
The meeting, under way in Assisi, is reflecting on the idea of the common good and, according to its organizers, seeks “to consider development understood as a moral question.”<\/p>\n
Bishop Crepaldi said Benedict XVI\u2019s call in Cagliari, Sardinia, earlier this month for \u201cthe birth of a new generation of Christians involved in society and politics\u201d was addressed to the Christian communities “who, as far as the formation new generations involved in society and politics is concerned, seem to be falling asleep.\u201d<\/p>\n
The bishop explained the need for Catholic laity involved in politics in the context of the “the idea, perhaps unexpressed, that secularization is an unstoppable process, a kind of \u2018destiny\u2019 of the West if not the entire planet.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSecularization, as God\u2019s ejection from the world to the point that he ceases to speak to it, is not the destiny of modernity,\u201d the bishop remarked.<\/p>\n
The prelate noted this is precisely \u201cthe principal challenge” that Pope John Paul II faced, and that Benedict XVI is currently confronting. “We must confidently join them as real protagonists, and not see ourselves as tired bit players in a script recited by others.”<\/p>\n
The 61-year-old bishop emphasized that \u201cthe social teaching of the Church is an instrument of evangelization and education in the faith.\u201d<\/p>\n
He warned of the effects of pluralism \u201con our communities, even on the unity of faith, unity in regard to the foundations of culture, on the sense of ecclesial belonging, on fidelity to [the Church\u2019s] pastors.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bishop Crepaldi pointed out that \u201cwhen it is claimed that Christ is only useful, but not indispensable, for man\u2019s understanding of himself and finding truly human solutions to development,\u201d and when we \u201csupport certain forms of pluralism without truth,\u201d then \u201cwe have gone beyond the bounds of legitimacy.\u201d<\/p>\n
He reaffirmed that \u201cGod cannot be left in the pew\u201d and that religion and faith \u201cmust not be excluded from public life or used only for limited pragmatic goals.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSecularist ideology is not neutral,” he warned, “but rather imposes an absolute vision.”<\/p>\n
\u201cPresenting a world without God is not synonymous with scientificity, objectivity, evaluative equanimity,\u201d the bishop said, adding that \u201cthose who decide to remove the crucifixes\u201d are not \u201cneutral,\u201d but \u201cwant a public space without crucifixes.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIf God disappears from the public square,\u201d Bishop Crepaldi said, \u201cour capacity to recognize the natural order, purpose and the \u2018good\u2019 begins to disappear.\u201d<\/p>\n
To avoid these dangers and renew the Christian community, the secretary for the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace indicated the urgency of a basic formation, beginning with the social teachings of the Church.<\/p>\n
He urged learning and teaching the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church: “This Compendium is often cited but little read, it is celebrated on many occasions, that is, \u2018occasionally,\u2019 but never seriously adopted.\u201d<\/p>\n
In regard to the political and social involvement of Catholics, Bishop Crepaldi noted: \u201cSometimes they censor themselves preventatively when they must enter and work in the public arena [\u2026] believing that this arena cannot permit references to faith and religion.<\/p>\n
“But it is precisely in this way that God disappears from the public square. Silently. By omission.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Here’s some timely and thought-provoking advice on faith and politics, from the place that reminds us all that we are summoned to be instruments of peace. This comes from Zenit: Catholics need to wake up when it comes to politics, and stop leaving “God in the pew,” says a Vatican aide. Bishop Giampaolo Crepaldi, secretary…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":204,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ripped-from-the-headlines"],"yoast_head":"\n
"God cannot be left in the pew" - The Deacon's Bench<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/09\/god-cannot-be-left-in-the-pew.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\""God cannot be left in the pew" - The Deacon's Bench\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Here’s some timely and thought-provoking advice on faith and politics, from the place that reminds us all that we are summoned to be instruments of peace. This comes from Zenit: Catholics need to wake up when it comes to politics, and stop leaving “God in the pew,” says a Vatican aide. Bishop Giampaolo Crepaldi, secretary…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/09\/god-cannot-be-left-in-the-pew.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Deacon's Bench\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2008-09-29T08:16:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Deacon Greg Kandra\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"\"God cannot be left in the pew\" - The Deacon's Bench","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/09\/god-cannot-be-left-in-the-pew.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"\"God cannot be left in the pew\" - The Deacon's Bench","og_description":"Here’s some timely and thought-provoking advice on faith and politics, from the place that reminds us all that we are summoned to be instruments of peace. This comes from Zenit: Catholics need to wake up when it comes to politics, and stop leaving “God in the pew,” says a Vatican aide. Bishop Giampaolo Crepaldi, secretary…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/09\/god-cannot-be-left-in-the-pew.html","og_site_name":"The Deacon's Bench","article_published_time":"2008-09-29T08:16:00+00:00","author":"Deacon Greg Kandra","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/09\/god-cannot-be-left-in-the-pew.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/09\/god-cannot-be-left-in-the-pew.html","name":"\"God cannot be left in the pew\" - The Deacon's Bench","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/#website"},"datePublished":"2008-09-29T08:16:00+00:00","dateModified":"2008-09-29T08:16:00+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/#\/schema\/person\/5a7b3c6e9d155e382842aa310ff9b1ee"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/09\/god-cannot-be-left-in-the-pew.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/09\/god-cannot-be-left-in-the-pew.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2008\/09\/god-cannot-be-left-in-the-pew.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"“God cannot be left in the pew”"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/","name":"The Deacon's Bench","description":"Where a Roman Catholic Deacon Ponders the World","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/#\/schema\/person\/5a7b3c6e9d155e382842aa310ff9b1ee","name":"Deacon Greg Kandra","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/114\/1144d939be636f641ea021e1d347f9fdx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/114\/1144d939be636f641ea021e1d347f9fdx96.jpg","caption":"Deacon Greg Kandra"},"description":"A Roman Catholic deacon serving the Diocese of Brooklyn, New York, Greg Kandra is News Director for the diocese's cable channel, NET (New Evangelization Television.) Prior to that, Deacon Greg worked for 26 years as a writer and producer for CBS News, where he contributed to \"The CBS Evening News with Katie Couric,\" \"60 Minutes II,\" \"48 Hours,\" (Emmy Award, Writers Guild of America Award) and \"Sunday Morning.\" He was co-writer for the acclaimed documentary \"9\/11,\" hosted by Robert DeNiro. (Emmy Award, Christopher Award, Peabody Award, Writers Guild of America Award.) His radio essays were featured in the bestselling book \"Deadlines and Datelines\" by Dan Rather. He's also a two-time winner of the Catholic Press Association Award. Other places you may find him: AMERICA, U.S. CATHOLIC, CATHOLIC DIGEST, REALITY (Redemptorist Communications) and THE BROOKLYN TABLET. He also contributes homiletic reflections to the parish resource CONNECT!, published by Liturgical Publications. In November 2009, he began serving a three-year term as a consultant to the Communications Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB). Deacon Greg grew up in Maryland (Go Terps!) but he and his wife today live in the beautiful borough of Queens, New York. You can contact Deacon Greg at dcngreg@gmail.com.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/author\/gkandra"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/204"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2767\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}