In the article by John Allen below this post, he describes the three pillars of Catholic Evangelicalism:
1. A strong defense of traditional Catholic identity, meaning attachment to classic markers of Catholic thought (doctrinal orthodoxy) and Catholic practice (liturgical tradition, devotional life, and authority).
2. Robust public proclamation of Catholic teaching, with the accent on Catholicism’s mission ad extra, transforming the culture in light of the Gospel, rather than ad intra, on internal church reform.
3. Faith seen as a matter of personal choice rather than cultural inheritance, which among other things implies that in a highly secular culture, Catholic identity can never be taken for granted. It always has to be proven, defended, and made manifest.
Michael Voris seems to fit John Allen's description. When I became pastor of the Church of the Most Holy Trinity in downtown Augusta, GA,way back 20 years ago in 1991, I took as one of my main teaching and preaching themes, "Our Catholic Identity." I never thought that to be "Evangelical Catholicism" at the time, as I feared in my greatly "Charismatic" parish that many of the Catholics in this movement had sold out to Pentecostal Protestantism in terms of ecclesiology and worship while maintaining a veneer of Catholicism in terms of doctrines and morality.
Evangelical Catholicism today, though, is thoroughly enamored with our Catholic tradition, an appreciation of the EF Mass and its spirituality while allowing for a more charismatic approach to prayer meetings that are supplements to one's attendance at more traditional styles of celebrating the Mass. Evangelical Catholicism is pro-life and pro-helping the poorest of the poor as Blessed Mother Teresa showed the way.
If you are a progressive, non Evangelical Catholic who likes politically correct religious analysis, don't watch this:
5 comments:
Michael Voris is the "Vox Populi", the voice of the REAL Catholic person. He has fearlessly pursued the causes of the current demise of our beloved Church including sexual, financial and liturgical abuses--ethics and morality are at the heart of our failures, and the liturgy, the greatest prayer of the Church, suffers as a result. Mr. Voris is a true warrior for the true faith. May God grant us all a fearless spirit in pursuing the Truth!
Amen,Father.
Michael Voris speaks and acts as our Bishops should act, but don't.
Keep in mind that one of the main ministries of bishops including the pope is to a "pontiff" which means in Latin "bridge builder" and from where we get our English word pontoon.
I agree Father, and building those bridges to potential converts and believers of other denominations is accomplished by clear, and unequivocal, truth. The enemy on the other hand should be clearly exposed for what they are, and not waste the effort trying to build a bridge to them.
Voris, in my opinion does both well, whereas I feel sometimes when I read the words of Bishops they are hedged, and politically correct, and worried more about offending than delivering the message. The Church Militant cries to be led, and Pope Benedict is a true leader, but between he and the laity seems to be the same old layers of bureaucracy filtering it out, instead of hierarchy handing it down.
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