by The Tablet Staff 

PROSPECT HEIGHTS — At a World Mission Sunday Mass Oct. 22 at the Co-Cathedral of St. Joseph, two Catholic schools in the Diocese of Brooklyn were honored for their contributions to the work of Catholic missions around the world. 

St. Bernadette Catholic Academy in Dyker Heights was honored for collecting the most funds for missions from Brooklyn, followed by St. Sebastian Catholic Academy in Woodside for contributing the most from Queens. Students and school leaders were honored for their efforts at the end of Mass. 

The students’ donations will support the Missionary Childhood Association, a pontifical organization that encourages children to donate to mission dioceses throughout the world. 

Collected funds, sent to the Propagation of the Faith Office in the Diocese of Brooklyn, will be used to build schools, hospitals, and orphanages, to develop water projects and to provide medical care, food, and clothing. 

Bishop Robert Brennan, who celebrated the Mass, spoke in his homily about missionaries in the world today and highlighted two missionaries from the diocese — Maryknoll Sisters Ita Ford, from Brooklyn, and Maura Clarke, from Queens — two of the four American churchwomen killed in El Salvador in 1980. The women were caring for the poor in the region amid the country’s civil war. 

Bishop Brennan also emphasized that Catholics at home can also be missionaries to those around us.

World Mission Sunday is always celebrated on the second to the last Sunday in October and is a day the Catholic Church around the world publicly renews its commitment to missionary work. 

The day, first designated in 1926 by Pope Pius XI, not only highlights the ongoing work of missions but also takes up a collection from Catholics worldwide to support this work of fulfilling the biblical mandate of bringing the Gospel message to all nations.