From a 2008 Easter Vigil homily:
3. The Gospel announcement is not relegated to a faraway history of two thousand years ago…it is a reality that repeats itself each time we place ourselves on teh road towards God and we allow ourselves to be met by Him. The Gospel tells of an encounter, a victorious encounter between the faithful God, passionate for His people, and us sinners, thirsty for love and searching, who have [finally] accepted placing ourselves on the road…on the road to find Him…to allow ourselves to be found by Him. In that instant, existential and temporal, we share the experience of the women: fear and joy at the same time; we experience the stupor of an encounter with Jesus Christ which overflows our desires but which never says “stay,” but rather “go.” The encounter relaxes us, strengthens our identity and sends us forth; puts us on the road agains so that, from encounter to encounter, we may reach the definitive encounter.
Sound familiar? Does it sound like this?
Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.(DCE 1)
But it was written by this man:
Get ready for more of the Hermeneutic of Continuity!
Of course you like this, David! It’s typical of what you will hear from any evangelical Protestant community. I am sure you will have heard, as a Lutheran, that faith is the fruit of an encounter with Jesus and an act of the will.
The same thesis can be found in Catholic spiritual writings; although you will not have discerned it in typical Tridentine counter-reformational apologetics.
Yes, Stephen, quite right – and I am about to make another post along the same lines. The fact is, the Catholic Church is undergoing an evangelical awakening, and the traditional evangelicals don’t quite know what to make of it – especially since we don’t seem to see this new found evangelicalism as conflicting in any way with our Tradition (Mary, indulgences etc.).