Medellín and the Imperative of the New Evangelization

Abstract

With this article, we wish to recover the origin and the original meaning of the expression “new evangelization”, born in the context of the Catholic Church in Latin America, under the spirit of renewal of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council at the Medellin Conference in 1968. It is not uncommon to attribute to John Paul II his paternity, since innumerable times the pontiff made use of the expression. But, it does not mean that he has captured and recognized his true face. His project, to a large extent, seems to have been distant from the spirit of Vatican II and the Latin American liberating tradition. It is evident that the concept “new evangelization”, shaped in Medellín, hasspecific connotation. However, it seems that certain processes of evangelization carried out by theCatholic Church itself, especially since the 1990s, were far from their original meaning. Not every so-called “new evangelization” is really new, both outside and here on our Continent. However, even though “ember under ashes”, the new evangelization, praised by Medellín, exists and resists against all hope. For this reason, the imperative for a “pastoral conversion” of the Aparecida Conference seems to be the best way to think about the validity of the “new evangelization” in postmodern times.