
Paula Katinas / The Tablet
CV NEWS FEED // Catholics in New York gathered together in downtown Brooklyn this past weekend to celebrate the landmark 50th anniversary of the Neocatechumenal Way in the United States.
The July 7 celebration at the Barclays Center, a famous basketball arena-concert venue and home to the Brooklyn Nets, saw 20,000 members of the faithful gather to celebrate the arrival of the Spanish-born Catholic movement in the US, according to reports.
Cardinal Christophe Pierre, the papal nuncio to the US, celebrated Mass alongside Bishop Robert Brennan of the Brooklyn Diocese and numerous other bishops and priests.
The Neocatechumenal Way is a movement of spiritual renewal that began in the shanty towns of Palomeras Altas, near Madrid, Spain, the movement’s website states. Two lay people, Spanish painter Francisco José Gómez Argüello and theology graduate Carmen Hernández, founded it. Pope Saint John Paul II recognized the movement in a letter in 1990 as “an itinerary of Catholic formation, valid for our society and for our times.”
During the Mass, the report stated, approximately 1,000 young men entering seminary stood to receive a blessing from Cardinal Pierre. Around 1,500 young women discerning religious life or missionary vocations also stood to receive a blessing from the Cardinal.
“Welcome home!” Bishop Brennan told those gathered in the arena. “You belong here.”
There are 1,100 Neocatechumenal Way communities in the US, according to the report, which noted that there are several communities in Brooklyn and Queens alone.
In 2008, under the pontificate of Pope Benedict XVI, the Pontifical Council for the Laity approved the movement’s Statutes. The Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith (now the Dicastery for the Doctrine of Faith) gave its doctrinal approval in 2010.
“The Neocatechumenal Way is at the service of bishops and pastors as an itinerary of rediscovery of baptism and ongoing formation in the faith, “ the website explains. “It is proposed to the faithful who wish to rekindle in their lives the richness of the Christian initiation.
