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What is Evangelization?
Evangelization is sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ. It is joyfully proclaiming the promise of salvation, our freedom from the bonds of sin and death, attainable through Jesus Christ.
We hope to convert individual people and society as a whole to belief in Christ, to encourage people to respond in faith to Christ's offer of salvation, through experiencing the powerful message of the Gospel alive and active in those of us who believe.
"There is no true evangelization if the name, the teaching, the life, the promises, the Kingdom and the mystery of Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God are not proclaimed." -Go and Make Disciples
What is the Good News of Jesus Christ?
The Good News of Jesus Christ, the message of the Gospel, is that God entered the world in Jesus Christ, who suffered and died for our sins and rose from the dead, to ensure for us the promise of eternal life.
The Good News of Jesus Christ is the story of Christ's life, death, and resurrection; the faithful response of the Christian community; and the promise of eternal life Jesus gave us.
The promise of eternal life is God's saving promise, the promise of our salvation. That is why the Good News of Jesus Christ, the Gospel, is sometimes referred to as the Story of Salvation.
The Good News, the Gospel, is also known as the Greek word Kerygma, which means preaching or proclamation. We believe that the preaching and proclamation of the Gospel is so important that we refer to it as the Proclamation, the Kerygma.
How Do We Evangelize?
We evangelize through the example of God's love that we are to each other in our daily lives. Our support for each other, our love for each other, and our faith in each other serve as an example and witness to the power of God's love. God is alive today and loves us. When we care for each other, for our children, for our neighbors, for those in need, and for strangers, we believe as Christians that we are demonstrating God's love for us.
We celebrate the saving power of Jesus alive among us through remembering and proclaiming his actions and recognizing their power at work in our lives.
"In daily life, family members evangelize each other; men and women, their future spouses; and workers, their fellow employees, by the simple lives of faith they lead. Through the ordinary patterns of our Catholic life, the Holy Spirit brings about conversion and a new life in Christ." -Go and Make Disciples
Why Do We Evangelize?
We evangelize because God asked us to do so. He wants us to share the message of the promise of salvation with everyone because He offers that promise to everyone. Jesus, more than a good person or a great teacher, is the power and wisdom of God who came to live among us. Jesus is our Savior because he saves us from our sin and from death. We evangelize because we want everyone to be free of sin and death.
"Becoming like us and accepting our human nature, he addresses in himself, in his death and resurrection, the brokenness of our lives. He suffers through our sin; he feels our pain; he knows the thirst of our death; he accepts the limits of our human life so that he might bring us beyond those limits." - Go and Make Disciples
"Taking on our death as Savior, Jesus was raised to life. In Christ, all can come to know that the sin, the coldness, the indifference, the despair, and the doubt of our lives are overcome by God's taking on our human nature and leading us to new life. In him, and him alone, is the promise of resurrection and new life." - Go and Make Disciples
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