‘Church failing to reach youth’

Calling on the laity to increase efforts to revive the faith, Catholic priest Fr. Catalino Arevalo cited a 2000 study that said the Philippines would no longer be a Catholic country in 40 years at the rate the Church was losing members.

Speaking at a symposium on lay spirituality at the University of Sto. Tomas on Friday, Arevalo said the study by a commission of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) that examined youth evangelization found that only six percent of young Filipinos today received “significant religious instruction.”

“They are not turning away, they are simply not being reached,” said Arevalo, who is professor emeritus at the Ateneo de Manila University and author of the book “Pedro Calungsod: Young Visayan Proto-martyr.”

Arevalo urged the laity to reflect on the life of Calungsod, a young lay missionary whose scheduled canonization on Oct. 21 would be “a moment of great pride” and a boost to the declining Catholic Church.

Calungsod, being a patron of the laity, “is symbolic of what the Catholics need to do to revive the faith,” said Arevalo, also remembered as the father-confessor of former President Corazon Aquino.

Calungsod was a Visayan teenager killed during a missionary expedition to the Ladrones Islands, renamed Marianas and now known as Guam.

The symposium noted that Oct. 11 marks the 50th anniversary of the Second Vatican Council, a global convention that led to the renewal of the Church and its role in the modern world, and the 20th anniversary of the “Catechism of the Catholic Church.”

Pope Benedict XVI has declared Oct. 11, 2012, to Nov. 24, 2013, the Year of Faith to promote reflection on the Vatican II documents and the catechism.

Retired Cebu Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal, who also spoke at the symposium, said these events helped fast-track the sainthood of Calungsod, even ahead of the popular Mother Teresa and Blessed John Paul II, among the more than 400 in line for canonization.

This, he said, was because Calungsod died a martyr. Non-martyrs require miracles for beatification and canonization.

Parañaque Bishop Jesse Eugenio Mercado, chair of the CBCP Episcopal Commission on the Laity, talked about strengthening Catholicism through “new ways of evangelization.”

“We have one same message, but because of the rapid changes in our society, it is important for us to adapt. The way we are going to present Jesus will vary according to the situation we are in,” Mercado told the Inquirer.

“To revive the faith, we should let the youth participate and express in their own ways their belief in Jesus. It can be through social media, rock concerts, hiphop dancing or theater plays, but without betraying the message of Jesus Christ,” he said.