We are blessed to have at our disposal so many excellent resources to assist Christian parents, catechists and teachers in their important mission of evangelization. One could become overwhelmed at a catechetical ministry fair exploring all the programs, manuals and audiovisual aids that abound as never before. Courses and seminars are even developed to help users know, identify and implement those resources best suited to their particular audience.
In one way, we are competing with all the other attention-grabbers in our world. Everyone is selling something as the product that will bring happiness and satisfaction. All of the distractions on the screens that surround us at almost every waking moment – the TV, the Internet, the smart phones and the flashy billboards – are vying for our time, attention and money. Even the news – which for all of its monotonous predictability is hardly “new” each day – is aimed at distracting us long enough to get us through the string of interspersed commercials lest the networks and cable companies lose their revenues.
Our challenge, in this sea of constant stimulation, is to somehow communicate the only real news that can save and renew humanity: the Good News of Jesus Christ. Whether we color Jesus as a hipster, a cool dude or a clowning figure – and sometimes we may have to just to get attention – it is not until the hearer’s heart is moved that healing can begin to take hold. Once it does, there is no doubt that is no mere distraction. The Good News is the real news!
That ground-breaking awareness for some may come during a retreat, a Cursillo or a Jornada when the time-out gives the Holy Spirit some space to move in. Most of the time, our lives are so crowded with noise and distractions that there is little room for reflection and prayerfulness so that we might hear the Lord speaking to us. How can we learn how our prayers are being answered if we are not even watching and listening?
Where programs, posters and prayer sessions are not making their impact, nothing beats good, personal faith-sharing. As Pope Francis reminded the young people celebrating World Youth Day with him in July, it is person-to-person that the Gospel is most effectively spread. This is evangelization as Jesus instructed his disciples to do it, going two-by-two! Such testimony is not essentially about instructing our companion on what he or she should believe or how to live but on demonstrating how Jesus has changed the life of the person bearing witness. That takes a great deal of humility and honesty to let our friend see our faults and weakness – even our sins – and how the power of the Lord’s love has healed us.
It is this kind of faith witness that was the story of St. Paul’s cross and effectiveness. So also with St. Peter, St. Thomas and so many of the Apostles and Christian martyrs. People knew all too well their sins and failings, but, more importantly, they also knew how the Lord made of them instruments of His grace when they started to trust Him.
As we prepare for a new season of learning and catechesis – in our schools, religious education programs and the RCIA journey – we should keep this in mind. Our Faith must not only be taught but “caught” through the moments of discovery when our listeners are convinced that it is not just talk but reality.
Growing in the Faith is a process, not a program. The latest and the greatest are the last and least among us. Jesus Himself – really, the first among us Who became the last and least as He assumed the condition of a slave – leads by His loving service to all humanity.
The time and patience He spends on His ever-erring disciples bear the signs of a lover more than a program designer. These gestures ultimately show up as the bloody stains on His hands and side, which open up for us the streams of forgiving mercy and deep healing. If one has a faith that is moving the mountains of fear, anxiety and doubt, it is always through some encounter with the personal presence of Jesus Christ.
Our mission as his Church is to be that Christ, the fullness of Him who fills all (cf. Eph. 1:23).
