Thirty-five years ago, on September 29, 1982, John Paul II sent a letter to the late Archbishop Joseph Mercieca and Bishop Nikol Cauchi in connection with a year-long Marian observance of the Church in Malta, which was intended to culminate in an International Mariological Congress.
In his letter, the Pope dwelt on why a call to spiritual renewal is likewise a call to consistency between faith and Christian living, stating that a community of faith and prayer “must show forth in its conduct what it professes and proclaims”.
Stressing that the belief of the Church must be expressed in both the private and public lives of its members, the Pope wrote that consistency must be manifested through an ever more visible and vital Christian witness in all the roles and functions in which the faithful find themselves.
“The Christian challenge – the call to consistency – involves decisive choices and sacrifices for everyone; it makes claims on those in humble conditions as well as those with lofty responsibilities.
For every category of people, Christianity has the same requirements: to embrace Christ in faith and to apply His teachings to the concrete situations of life.”
At the time, many Maltese people, from every sector of society, understood and were committed to following this advice from John Paul II.
Still, since then, various complex currents have reached the life of the Maltese people, and the call to Christian consistency has had to face many new challenges, mainly propelled by rapid cultural change.
Indeed, today various questions arise regarding the present reality of the so-called ‘Catholic Malta’
Indeed, today various questions arise regarding the present reality of the so-called “Catholic Malta”.
For instance, what kind of connection do many Catholics in Malta still have or want to have with Catholic teaching? How do they feel about following Catholic principles and values in the practice of their faith, especially in the “concrete situations of their life”? Do we still believe, as a society and a nation, that the Gospel is a message of life and communion?
The Church in Malta has made significant strides in promoting its view of the human person in the public square and in improving its own witness to the living out of respect for the human person in daily life.
However, the Church is also facing a number of serious tests, among them a mainly social-media-propelled confusion regarding the true substance of Christian marriage and the family and a profound loss of understanding of the basic Catholic teachings on a number of morally very sensitive areas.
One very delicate issue in this setting, of course, concerns the freedom of the individual’s personal conscience, especially when facing difficult choices.
In the Christian tradition, ‘conscience’, con-scientia, means ‘with knowledge’ – that is, ourselves, our being, is open and can listen to the voice of being itself, the voice of God.
Addressing the clergy of the dioceses of Belluno-Feltre and Treviso on July 24, 2007, Pope Benedict XVI said that “in the depths of our being, not only can we listen to the needs of the moment, to material needs, but we can also hear the voice of the Creator Himself and thus discern what is good and what is bad”.
Vatican Council II encourages believers to harmonise those rights and duties which are theirs as members of the Church and those which they have as members of society, remembering that, in every temporal affair, they must be guided by a Christian conscience (Lumen Gentium, 36).
Charles Buttigieg is a former PRO of the Archdiocese of Malta.