Guatemala City, Guatemala, Nov 27, 2003 / 22:00 pm
During a press conference at the II American Missionary Conference (CAM2), being held in Guatemala, Cardinal Rodolfo Quezada, Archbishop of Guatemala City, warned the greatest challenge the Church in the region faces is secularization and not the presence of evangelicals.
“The great challenge the Church in Central America faces is not about whether the number of Catholics is going up or down—the great challenges are disbelief and indifference, the complete exclusion of God from one’s life,” the Cardinal told journalists at the CAM2 press conference, which was attended as well by the Pope’s special envoy to the event, Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe.
Cardinal Quezada insisted that “the number of those indifferent, the number of non-believers has indeed gone up in recent years,” although he also acknowledged that “there are other religious institutions that are having some success” in Central America.
The Cardinal also warned that “members of other Christian denominations are filling in the gaps that the Catholic Church is leaving open,” but he clarified that the Catholic Church today is more alive and dynamic, with a greater commitment to the poor and to evangelization.
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