Evangelization Missions as One of the Ways of Pastoral Conversion of the Parish: From Theory to Practice

Abstract

In his Evangelii gaudium, Pope Francis recognizes the evangelizing role of parishes in the life of the Church and writes that “the call to review and renew our parishes has not yet sufficed to bring them nearer to people, to make them environments of living communion and participation, and to make them completely mission-oriented” (EG 28). In this context, the Pope also addresses a call to parishes for “a pastoral and missionary conversion which cannot leave things as they presently are,” asking them to abandon “the complacent attitude that says: ‘we have always done it this way’” (EG 25; 33). The author of this article, a pastoral theologian, aims to echo Francis’s call to theologians to consider their “service as part of the Church’s saving mission” and to “not be content with a desk-bound theology” (EG 133). In his article, the author first presents the theological presuppositions of evangelizing missions, also referred to by some as evangelizing retreats (1). He then shows how such missions were implemented in the Marian parish of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Lublin in May 2023 by the missionary team of which he was part (2). The article ends with conclusions and pastoral propositions (3).