In recent years, the word evangelization has begun to resonate with a different tone. It no longer vibrates like a cry from the heart, but like a carefully calibrated slogan. In parishes, movements, and dioceses in Argentina—and especially under the influence of the Alpha Movement, born in England in the 1990s and expanded with remarkable speed—the mission has been wrapped in a new language that seems modern, attractive, even effective. But behind that permanent smile and the warm lights of the gatherings, many perceive an unsettling sensation: faith is being administered like a market product.
Alpha presents itself as a “method of Christian initiation” that promotes encounter with Jesus through informal talks, videos, music, and shared meals. It sounds harmless, even charming. However, the question that many in the Church are beginning to ask—and that they did not dare to voice aloud—is this: what kind of Christianity is being born under this emotional and empathetic veneer?
The Marketing Pastoral
In numerous countries, bishops and theologians have warned that the logic of Alpha is not theological but managerial: closer to the dynamics of a spiritual startup than to the Church’s missionary tradition.
In Argentina, this model is expanding rapidly. It is promoted by well-funded lay movements, parishes seeking to “renew” themselves, and pastoral teams tired of indifference. But behind the enthusiasm, a worrying phenomenon is growing: catechetical processes are shortened, confession is postponed, vocational discernment is diluted, and the cross—the central symbol of our faith—is replaced by the emotional testimony of a sensory experience. It is a “pastoral of spiritual well-being” that speaks much of God’s love, but almost nothing of sin, sacrifice, or the truth that saves.
A Misinterpreted Encounter
In April 2023, Pope Francis received representatives of the Alpha Movement at the Vatican. It was a private, cordial audience in which—as he usually does—the Holy Father encouraged those seeking to announce Christ in the contemporary world. But that reception did not constitute doctrinal approval or formal ecclesial endorsement of the method. It was a pastoral gesture of openness and dialogue, not a blank check to transform catechesis into spectacle or to act without the discernment of the universal Church.
However, in some circles in our country, that encounter has been presented as tacit legitimation of the Alpha program, even using it as an argument of authority against critics. The Pope is quoted, his name is invoked, photographs of the audience are shown, but it is omitted to remember that no audience equates to official recognition.
From that misunderstanding, initiatives multiply where the approval of a diocesan bishop is enough to install the method without theological evaluation or pastoral supervision. Episcopal accompaniment is confused with doctrinal authorization, and thus a way is opened for an evangelization that responds more to the logic of enthusiasm than to fidelity to the Magisterium.
The Risk of a Light Church
The Alpha Movement, with its inclusive language and appearance of openness, has managed to enter where doctrinal rigidity had closed doors. But in that same gesture, it has emptied the content of the faith, turning it into a feeling without demand, a Christianity without a cross. The immediate fruits are undeniable: full temples, smiles, applause, emotional testimonies. The long-term fruits, however, are alarming: believers without roots, communities without doctrine, priests reduced to animators, and a liturgy turned into spectacle.
Pope Francis has warned on repeated occasions against “spiritual worldliness” and the “self-referential Church.” However, many promoters of Alpha shield themselves in his figure, presenting the method as “a practical application of the Pope’s kerygma.”
But the kerygma is not a motivational workshop. It is an announcement that wounds and saves, that demands conversion and provokes resistance. It is not that Alpha is the enemy, but that it represents the symptom of a deeper evil: the banalization of faith.
Argentina: Laboratory of a Light Faith
In our country, the implementation of the Alpha method has been accelerated by the pastoral crisis and the desire—sometimes desperate—to “fill the parishes.” Some bishops endorse it, others remain silent. But many priests, in private, recognize that something has been lost: the depth of spiritual accompaniment, the centrality of the sacraments, doctrinal clarity. In their place, an ephemeral emotion reigns, a community sustained by stimuli, not by grace.
Meanwhile, the young people who once participated in Alpha seek “new experiences,” and groups multiply without discernment. The fire of the Spirit seems to have been replaced by the emotion of the moment. It is the risk of an entertained Church, effective but empty.
The Price of Silence
The greatest danger is not Alpha, but the silence of those who see and say nothing. Theologians, pastors, mature laity: many prefer not to disturb. They fear appearing “old-fashioned,” “unrenewed,” “not synodal enough.” But fidelity to the Gospel does not consist in following fashions, but in keeping the flame lit when the world offers neon lights. If discernment disappears, faith turns into emotional ideology, and Christianity becomes a mirror of the world it pretended to transform.
An Open Question
Can a movement born from Protestant pragmatism become the heart of Catholic renewal? Can the Eucharistic mystery coexist with a spirituality that relegates the sacraments to a second plane? Can the Church evangelize if it first allows itself to be evangelized by the market?
It is not about rejecting every attempt at pastoral innovation. It is about remembering that salvation is not an aesthetic experience or a personal growth course, but the encounter with the crucified and risen Christ. There—and only there—the human soul finds its center.
When the Gospel Becomes Fire Again
The Church does not need more methods, it needs more martyrs; not more strategies, but more tears; not more introductory courses, but lives given over. When methods pass and fashions fade, only one question will remain in the air, like judgment and promise:
Who will announce Christ when the whole world speaks of itself?