Madrid, Spain, Aug 17, 2007 / 08:48 am
Cardinal Antonio Cañizares of Toledo said this week Christians need to strengthen their faith in the resurrection in order to confront the “light” mentality of the times characterized by the “nihilistic tetralogy” of hedonism, consumerism, permissiveness and relativism.
“Without faith in the resurrection,” the cardinal said, Christians lose the power to confront “the ‘light’ man of the civilization of our times, who carries as his banner a nihilistic tetralogy: hedonism, consumerism, permissiveness and relativism.” In other words, this modern set of beliefs centers on four things which all lack a foundation in the truth.
The elements of this nihilistic tetralogy create “a man without substance, without content, given over to money, power, success and unrestricted and limitless pleasure,” Cardinal Cañizares explained. Such individuals “lack orientation, have great moral emptiness and are unhappy even though materially they have almost everything,” he said.
The cardinal lamented that in today’s world, “faith in the resurrection has weakened, there has been too much silence in the teaching of catechetics and in preaching, and with all of that the Christian faith has been damaged” and reduced to “just another moral system.”