Last weeks reading provided an initial mention of the word that has many interpretations in the mind of most Catholics. And today, in the readings, the words of Jesus, the thoughts of St. Paul and the informing words of the Book of Kings continue that thrust. The word is evangelization. Particularly, these three readings bring us to one of the primary components of evangelization — missionary activity. Unfortunately the interpretations that most Catholics attribute to the concept are far from the call of the writings in the documents of the Second Vatican Council.
Remember how missionary interest was established in our learning days? Pagan babies needed to be saved? Priests, sisters and brothers, left homeland to go to foreign continents to indoctrinate those who were not so well gifted with the faith as we were. This was the mentality before Vatican II. The documents of the Council call us to accept evangelization as the essential mission of the Church.
In one of the documents of the Council, titled by its Latin translation words of introduction, Ad Gentes, affirms that the Church is, at its core, missionary. But, please note, that these documents bring to us a new meaning of mission and missionary. No longer is simply sending money and men and women to foreign lands to the understanding of mission today. The call of Vatican II and evangelization is to understand mission as wherever we are and missionaries as all the baptized faithful.
What this means for the Church today, for our parish and for you and for me is that we are called to proclaim in an active way what we believe. No longer is the life of the parish simply focusing attention on the people already there. Paulist priest, Fr. Frank DeSiano hits the nail on the head: "We see the people we are conditioned to see." The fact is that the many we should be ministering to are invisible to us.
What we as Church or parish spend most of our time doing is establishing and strengthening the goal of every good Catholic – getting to heaven. We achieve this by getting to Mass every weekend (clearly a message a large percentage of Catholics no longer regard as essential), going to confession at least once a year and avoiding mortal sin. But where is our sense of attention to the baptism call of Jesus to share actively in the mission of Jesus and his mission. We have become consumer-like. We buy what we think is good for ourselves.
Unfortunately, we have not become true disciples of Jesus. We have not become a believer who want to proclaim what we believe. We have become believers who only want to share with ourselves. If you stop and think about this, maybe this is why there are so many empty places in our churches today. We have lost or, perhaps, never fully accepted or understood that our missionary life is to proclaim, to go out beyond ourselves to others. How rare it is today to hear a Catholic invite another person who has either fallen away from the Church or has not religion to attend Church with them. And how often do those who bring such a person to our churches find the dead, not interesting: ill prepared homilies that fail to address the real needs of believers seeking to be disciples, and parishioners just sitting in pews, looking at watches, rarely joining in any hospitality, never singing out with joy because we know that we are so blessed to be disciples.
When we see our baptism , the putting on of the cloak of the prophet, as our own ordination into the missionary vocation, only then will be go beyond a half-empty church or an almost dead parish that only cares for itself.
This is the challenge for every parish — not just Our Lady of Victory parish. If we are a family of believers in the words and works of Jesus Christ, if we are willing to live what our baptism calls us to live, if we stop our gazing only upon ourselves and our needs, only then, only then will our churches be sources of support, sources of excitement, sources of true evangelization that will bring fire and enthusiasm to ourselves and those we want to know about the goodness of Jesus Christ.
Remember how missionary interest was established in our learning days? Pagan babies needed to be saved? Priests, sisters and brothers, left homeland to go to foreign continents to indoctrinate those who were not so well gifted with the faith as we were. This was the mentality before Vatican II. The documents of the Council call us to accept evangelization as the essential mission of the Church.
In one of the documents of the Council, titled by its Latin translation words of introduction, Ad Gentes, affirms that the Church is, at its core, missionary. But, please note, that these documents bring to us a new meaning of mission and missionary. No longer is simply sending money and men and women to foreign lands to the understanding of mission today. The call of Vatican II and evangelization is to understand mission as wherever we are and missionaries as all the baptized faithful.
What this means for the Church today, for our parish and for you and for me is that we are called to proclaim in an active way what we believe. No longer is the life of the parish simply focusing attention on the people already there. Paulist priest, Fr. Frank DeSiano hits the nail on the head: "We see the people we are conditioned to see." The fact is that the many we should be ministering to are invisible to us.
What we as Church or parish spend most of our time doing is establishing and strengthening the goal of every good Catholic – getting to heaven. We achieve this by getting to Mass every weekend (clearly a message a large percentage of Catholics no longer regard as essential), going to confession at least once a year and avoiding mortal sin. But where is our sense of attention to the baptism call of Jesus to share actively in the mission of Jesus and his mission. We have become consumer-like. We buy what we think is good for ourselves.
Unfortunately, we have not become true disciples of Jesus. We have not become a believer who want to proclaim what we believe. We have become believers who only want to share with ourselves. If you stop and think about this, maybe this is why there are so many empty places in our churches today. We have lost or, perhaps, never fully accepted or understood that our missionary life is to proclaim, to go out beyond ourselves to others. How rare it is today to hear a Catholic invite another person who has either fallen away from the Church or has not religion to attend Church with them. And how often do those who bring such a person to our churches find the dead, not interesting: ill prepared homilies that fail to address the real needs of believers seeking to be disciples, and parishioners just sitting in pews, looking at watches, rarely joining in any hospitality, never singing out with joy because we know that we are so blessed to be disciples.
When we see our baptism , the putting on of the cloak of the prophet, as our own ordination into the missionary vocation, only then will be go beyond a half-empty church or an almost dead parish that only cares for itself.
This is the challenge for every parish — not just Our Lady of Victory parish. If we are a family of believers in the words and works of Jesus Christ, if we are willing to live what our baptism calls us to live, if we stop our gazing only upon ourselves and our needs, only then, only then will our churches be sources of support, sources of excitement, sources of true evangelization that will bring fire and enthusiasm to ourselves and those we want to know about the goodness of Jesus Christ.
