Partnership involves Saint Paul University, Catholic Christian Outreach, and Mission of the Redeemer Ministries
OTTAWA (CCN)
The Summer Institute of New Evangelization (SINE) Aug. 8-17 at Saint Paul University entered its third year this summer and will see its first graduates of the three-year program.
“It’s working out well,” said SINE co-director Michael Dopp. SINE offers participants the option of receiving university credit and a certificate in new evangelization; a certificate without university credit; and participation without either. Those obtaining credit have higher requirements for the course work, he said.
The SINE is a result of a partnership among Saint Paul University, Catholic Christian Outreach (CCO) and Dopp’s Mission of the Redeemer Ministries. About 55 students are participating, with about 15 enrolled in classes at Saint Paul University and another 40 taking part online.
This year, the program is offering Year I and Year III programs, Dopp said. Thus, the second and third year students are both taking Year III. Next year, the SINE will offer Year I and Year II, and continue alternating the second and third year programs. “This allows for larger classes and more discussion,” Dopp said.
The third year program features a course on Leaders for the Renewal of the World taught by CCO president Jeff Lockert. It also features a course on supernatural charisms or spiritual gifts for evangelization, featuring guest speakers such as Fr. Sean Wenger, a Companion of the Cross priest who pastors St. Mary’s Parish in Ottawa.
The third year program also features a course on Frameworks of Evangelization, or different models used by evangelists such as Sherry Weddell’s five faith thresholds, that show the various stages people go through from having no faith in God to a personal relationship in Jesus Christ, Dopp said.
The first year program again offered a talk on the Kerygma by Military Ordinariate Bishop Scott McCaig, who taught the course in previous years when he was General Superior of the Companions of the Cross.
Bishop McCaig stressed the Kerygma the first step that brings about a conversion to the Person of Jesus Christ. This Gospel Message is not to be confused with teaching, exhortation or homilies.
The basic message of the Good News can be found in passages in Acts, he said. Even within the New Testament, however, depending on the audience, the Kerygma showed some development even within the New Testament, he said.
The essential Kerygma is about the Person, Jesus Christ and His Death and Resurrection and what that means for our salvation, he said. Jesus’ death is redemptive; He died for our sins.
His Resurrection reveals Christ’s victory over sin and death, Bishop McCaig explained. The Kerygma also includes the proclamation Jesus Christ is Lord, God the Son, sitting at the right hand of God.
The Kerygma also concerns the Kingdom of God, he said. Jesus reveals the Kingdom, and that He is King. He also reveals a clash of Kingdoms, one of darkness and one of Christ, “God’s beloved Son.”
The Church is the seed of the Kingdom, he said, one that is inaugurated by signs and wonders that “authenticate the Gospel.” The Good News also looks ahead to the consummation of the Messianic Age with the return of Christ. The Holy Spirit in the Church is a sign of Christ’s present power and glory.
Above all, the Kerygma is a “call to conversion,” he said, a “turning away from evil and a turning towards God.”
“Jesus began his public ministry with the call to conversion,” he said. “The theme of conversion runs throughout the preaching of the apostolic Church.”
“The Kerygma always closes with an appeal for repentance, the offer of forgiveness and of the Holy Spirit, and the promise of salvation, that is, of ‘the life of the Age to Come’ to those who enter the elect community,” Bishop McCaig said.
