This coming Pentecost will mark the third anniversary of Go Make Disciples, our diocesan evangelizing initiative.
In the course of these years, during all of the challenges, suffering, and unrest we have borne, our pastors and parishes have been steadily working to build a culture of prayer, faith, and Gospel witness, focused on the Eucharist and the urging of Jesus at the Great Commission: “Go into the world, preach the Gospel, and make disciples.”
Bearing fruit
In these past weeks, I have been meeting with every pastor, his evangelization leads, lay leaders in the parish, and the diocesan mentor to receive an update on the progress of Go Make Disciples.
In many of our parishes, these steady efforts are beginning to bear rich fruit.
Through small group gatherings, parishioners are developing a living relationship with the Lord, learning to pray, and gaining the confidence to share their faith with others.
Some parishes have catechized, taught, and inspired their people to embrace the four holy habits we have been emphasizing as fundamental spiritual practices: Weekly Mass, daily prayer, monthly Confession, and Friday penance.
Catholics have gone door-to-door in some places, inviting folks to a parish mission and Mass, giving out bulletins, and offering to pray with people.
Dedicated school and religious education couples and families have become ambassadors, engaging their peers in friendship, and inviting them into a greater participation in parish life.
Many parishes have focused more on hospitality, knowing that we need to befriend folks in relationships of trust before they may start getting more involved.
Myriads of new groups in our parishes offer Bible study, catechism classes, spiritual opportunities for mothers, and men’s ministry.
All of this activity is certainly moving many brothers and sisters in our diocese closer to the Lord and the Church.
The fundamental objective
We must never lose sight of the fundamental objective of Go Make Disciples, however, which is to form disciple-makers, Catholics, in other words, who do not only live their faith with passion and generosity but also have the capacity to form others as disciples.
This evangelizing dimension is paramount. Imagine if the apostles and saints simply lived their faith quietly among themselves without ever reaching out to others or witnessing the resurrection of Jesus to people who had never heard of Him.
Imagine if all of the priests, Religious, deacons, teachers, catechists, and parents stopped preaching, forming, and inspiring others in the Catholic faith.
The reality of God, the truth of Jesus Christ, and the power of the Gospel come to us from outside of our consciousness, offered to every person as the saving gift of divine knowledge.
The faith is not some wishful thinking that we have fabricated ourselves.
We have received our knowledge of God and faith in Jesus through the witness of countless people in our lives. Praise be to God for every one of them!
For this reason, as St. Paul says in Romans 10: 14-17, “How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent? . . . So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing the Word of God.”
Answering our calls
By virtue of our Baptism, we have received power from Jesus Christ to live in the grace that He has won for us and to witness our faith to others through our words and actions.
Imagine if every practicing Catholic in our diocese either brought someone back to the practice of the Catholic faith or brought one person into the Church every five years! We would be doubling our numbers twice a decade.
Such a goal should not appear unreachable to us. The apostles did it. The saints did it.
Those first followers of Christ had two gifts: Their experience of the risen Christ and the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
We have received the same graces to go forth and evangelize others so that they know the peace, joy, and love of life on high in the Lord, and the eternal salvation flowing from His passion, death, and resurrection.
This is our mission. This is the mission of the Church. This is the mission of Christ.
All that we are striving to do Into the Deep is to better align our resources and gifts so that we can reach more and more people with the life-changing, dynamic, and eternal love of Jesus Christ.
I am grateful to our priests, deacons, Religious, consecrated, lay leaders, and lay faithful for all that you are doing to Go Make Disciples and share the richness of our Catholicism.