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THE
NEOCATECHUMENAL
WAY
New Catholic Encyclopedia
The Neocatechumenal Way, or in popular parlance, the
Neocatechumenate,
is a loosely organized Catholic renewal and catechetical apostolate founded in 1964 in the
Palomeras slums of Madrid by Kiko Arguello, an artist and musician. It grew out of
Arguello's religious experience and personal conversion. He continues as a chief catechist
of the movement and is currently a consultor to the Pontifical Council on the Laity. From
the start, the Neocatechumenate received the approval of the bishop of Madrid at the time,
Casimiro Morcillo.
In 1974 Pope Paul VI welcomed members of the
Neocatechumenal communities in a general audience and declared that this "way"
after baptism would "renew in today's Christian communities those effects of maturity
and deepening that, in the primitive Church, were realized by the period of preparation
for baptism." Twenty-five years later, in 1990, Pope John Paul II officially
recognized the Neocatechumenal Way as "an itinerary of Catholic formation, valid for
our society and for our times" and encouraged bishops and priests in the Church to
"value and support this work for the new evangelization." Again in 1994, Pope
John Paul II praised the Neocatechumenal Way for showing that "the small community,
sustained by the Word of God and by the dominical Eucharist, becomes a place of communion,
where the family recovers the sense and the joy of its fundamental mission to transmit
both natural and supernatural life."
With the encouragement of Pope Paul VI and Pope John Paul II, the Neocatechumenal Way has
spread to dioceses whose bishops welcome it and in parishes whose pastors are committed to
it. As of 1990 the Neocatechumenal Way claimed about 200,000 members in eighty-seven
countries, organized in 10,000 small communities in 3,000 parishes in 600 dioceses. In the
United States, they are represented in the archdioceses of Denver, Newark and Washington,
as well as on the West Coast and Texas.
Explicitly avoiding the appellations
"movement" or "association", the Neocatechumenal Way is a self-styled
program or apostolate of Christian formation. With its stress of exclusive fellowship,
intense personal commitment, simplicity of life, communal sharing, and apostolic zeal, the
Neocatechumenal Way takes its inspiration from the structure and ethos of the first
Christian communities who were known as adherents of "the Way".
The program seeks to recover and replicate the early Christian catechumenal pattern of
kerygma, conversion and liturgy as a phased or progressive formation of new Christians :
the announcement of salvation that calls for moral decision and thus changes the lives of
its hearers and is sealed by participation in the sacramental life of the Church.
Proponents of the Neocatechumenal program offer it to Christians who are already baptized
but who lack adequate formation in the faith and are thus "quasi-catechumens".
It appeals to committed Catholics who want to deepen their faith and to fallen-away
Catholics who want to rediscover it.
*Service to the Local Church* Although the
Neocatechumenate is fundamentally a lay movement, the commitment and leadership of the
diocesan bishop and the local pastors are crucial to its organization and activities. The
founders and leaders of the Neocatechumenate stress its role as a service to the local
church. The Eucharist, celebrated by the pastor with great reverence in homes or in small
groups, is the anchor of the Neocatechumenal Way. Participants in the seven-year long
formation program are called 'catechumens' in order to signal the fact that even the
baptized person may not yet have attained a sufficient level of conversion and knowledge
in the life of the faith. While continuing to live at home, catechumens participate in the
formation as members of communities of fifteen to thirty members who meet at least twice a
week for catechesis and to celebrate the Eucharist. Day-long meetings are held monthly, as
well as occasional social gatherings and regular 'scrutinies' and liturgies to mark the
transition to a new stage of formation. Eventually some members become 'itinerants' and
move on in order to establish Neocatechumenal communities elsewhere.
Another important aspect of the
Neocatechumenate is its dedication to the cultivation of religious and priestly vocations
and to the foundation of 'missionary seminaries' with formation programs patterned on the
principles of the Neocatechumenal Way. The best known of these seminaries is the
Redemptoris Mater in Rome. Others have been founded in Madrid, Warsaw,
Bangalore, Newark, Medellin, Bogota, Callao (Peru) and Takamatsu (Japan). The seminaries are distinguished by
their combination of Christian initiation and formation for the presbyterate. More than
1,500 young people in the first half of 1990 have expressed vocations. In 1990 Pope John
Paul II assigned to Bishop Paul Josef Cordes, vice-president of the Pontifical Council for
the Laity, responsibility of the Neocatechumenal Communities.
Bibliography :
G. GENNARINI, "The Role of the Christian Family in Announcing the Gospel in Today's
World," L'Osservatore Romano English Edition (19 October 1987) 18-19;
"The Neo-catechumenal Way" The Tablet (19 March 1988),
JOHN PAUL II, "Address to Itinerant Catechists", L'Osservatore Romano, English
Edition (2 February 1994) 10-11;
Epistola R.P.D. Paolo Iosepho Cordes, episcopo tit. Naissitano, Delegato "in
persona"
ad Communitates Novi Catecumenatus, AAS 82 (1990) 1513-1515,
PAUL VI "Address to Neocatechumenal Communities," Notitiae 95-96 (1974) 230
K. WALSH "An Exclusive Presence", The Tablet (2 July 1994) 831-832
J.A. DI NOIA
NEW CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA
Volume XIX Supplement 1989-1995
pp. 280-281
The Catholic University of America, Washington DC
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