Word to the Wise
Thursday, February 5, 2015 - Wednesday in the 4th Week in Ordinary Time
[Heb 12:4-7, 11-15 and Mark 6:1-6]Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over unclean spirits.....[Mark]
FEBRUARY 5 ST. AGATHA [virgin and martyr]
One of Pope Francis' most explicit challenges to the church is for each and every baptized person to become a "missionary disciple." (Cf. THE JOY OF THE GOSPEL) That term may conjure up in American Catholics' minds an association with the Mormon missionaries on their bicycles or the Jehovah's Witnesses - all of whom go door to door in communities. When I was pastor of a parish in San Antonio, the parish council decided to do an informal survey of the households in the parish because we were sure that there were more Catholics than were on the registration list. We asked for volunteers to go door to door on one day and simply ask if there were Catholics living in the household. We trained the volunteers on how to do this. (The "trainer" was a Jewish community organizer from Newark, NJ, working in San Antonio!). On a beautiful Saturday morning we held a little "commissioning" ceremony and sent them out two by two. They all came back later with interesting stories - some good, some not so good. However, they all also said, "We never want to do that again!" Can we imagine what Jesus would have said to the Twelve if they came back and said, "We never want to do that again?"
By virtue of our baptism we have all been called to be missionary disciples. The faith we are blessed to possess is not a private matter. Pope emeritus Benedict XVI pointed out that Christianity is not spread by prosyletizing but by attraction. It may not be possible for us all to go door to door, but perhaps we can go next door. To those who say, "I never talk about politics or religion, " I reply that I can understand about politics, but not about "religion." Faith is meant to be shared. Can we make it attractive by the way we live and express the "joy of the gospel?" AMEN
config
view
logs
4096.0 KB
146 ms
4
