Poland: Pallottine School of New Evangelization

By: Fr. Krzysztof Kralka SAC 
 
St. Vincent Pallotti’s wish was to awaken apostolic vocations among all states of the Church, so that all would know God’s Infinite Love. We need not only those who preach the Gospel in Church, but due to the world’s increasing secularization, we need a host of formators who will be able to teach others how to preach Jesus in an ever-changing world.
 
The Pallottine School of the New Evangelization, which was officially established on June 16, 2011, tries to fulfill Pallotti’s desires and responds to the call of St. John Paul II to take up the New Evangelization. The school was initiated by Fr. Krzysztof Kralka SAC at the Pallottine Seminary in Oltarzew in 2007. In the first phase of its existence, the environment gathered Pallottine seminarians and a few lay people who had the experience of participating in evangelization courses and working in teams conducting courses.
 
When Fr. Krzysztof Kralka SAC came to Lublin, he began the formation of new people and entire communities willing to create the School of New Evangelization; during which more than 2,000 people were formed for evangelization.
 
The basic tool of the work of the Pallottine School of New Evangelization ins the Pastoral Program of St. Andrew created in Mexico by H. Prado Flores. It presents the program of formation of evangelizers and formators of evangelizers divided in three stages:

1. Basic: basis of Christian life (7 courses)
2. Growth: preparation for the mission of evangelization (7 courses)
3. Complementing: formation of formators (7 courses)

 
Activity of the School:

1. Evangelization courses: led by formed evangelistic teams aim at undertaking of evangelization in their living environments and teach how to form new evangelizers. In each of the courses there are on average 50 people (priests, seminarians, nuns, lay people) and is run by a team of about 10 people (including priest, preachers, musicians, and other ministries run by people of different states). Every year, we organize around 100 such courses in various parts of Poland, in which approximately 5,000 people participate. From the start, we have also extablished two new schools for the diocese, and now are in the process of establishing another two. We run a formation in seminaries- training seminarians- and we conduct retreats for priests in dioceses and nuns.
2. Community “Friends of Bridegroom”: it is an evangelizing movement with approximately 10,000 people. Through our own formation program, the Community forms apostles and formators of the evangelizers. The community works on the basis of multiplication, multiplying the communities in the Church. We strive to establish an evangelizing community in every parish. At present, there are 110 communities in Poland, England and Germany which gather Poles, but the purpose of foreign communities is to evangelize the inhabitants of these countries. Together with the teams, we conduct retreats and evangelization missions in the parishes.
3. Holy Mass with prayer for healing: initiated by us in many cities across Poland, which bring together thousands of people
4. Worship band: Named “Following Jesus,” it consists of about 35 musicians and vocalists, and have released a studio album
5. Formation House for Men: At present, 3 Pallottines, 3 diocesan seminarians, and 5 young men are discerning their vocations
6. Publications: With regards to evangelization, we have prepared CDs containing conferences and retreats, formation notebooks for communities and books on various religious topics
7. The office coordinating all work: At present there are 8 employees, training in evangelization and setting up new communities