Tourism as a way of new evangelization in Europe

Over the last decades, we have been witnessing in Europe a stronger and stronger influence of secularization and dechristianization. As these trends intensify, there is a need in the Church for more effective preventive measures described as new evangelization. It is usually defined as the search for new methods and means of expression in the Gospel message, corresponding to the mentality and ways of thinking of modern man. The article shows that the world of tourism can be such a space of new evangelization. In order for this evangelization to be effective, it is necessary to get to know and to understand the evangelical values of tourism. On the other hand, it is necessary to change pastoral methods and thinking in a number of areas.

The relationship between nationality and religiosity on the example of the Archdiocese of Vilnius

The purpose of the study presented in this paper was to compare objectively measurable indices of religiosity (dominicantes and communicantes) for the national groups living in the same area. The area of the Archdiocese of Vilnius inhabited by the Polish and Lithuanian communities was analysed. The study attempted to determine the number of inhabitants of a given nationality within the boundaries of individual parishes, and then, owing to field measurements, to calculate the indices for both these national groups. Factors that could have an effect on the misinterpretation of the results were also discussed.
The results obtained in the case of the dominicantes index were two times higher, and for the communicantes index three times higher for the Polish community. This seems to confirm the hypothesis of the relationship between national identity and the degree of piety, which is verified by the turnout at the mandatory Sunday liturgy. However, the number of operational units under the study was too small to be able to draw more general conclusions about the entire communities living in the study area. In the Archdiocese of Vilnius, there are 30 parishes with at least one Holy Mass on Sundays in both languages. Five parishes of various ethnic compositions were selected for the survey: the parishes of Landvars and Trakai with the dominant Lithuanian population, the parish of Rudziszki, where there is a similar number of representatives of the two nationalities, and the parishes of Podbrzezie and Kowalczuki dominated by the Polish population.