Everyone So Loves Jesus, We Share Him with Others

What would the Church in western North Carolina look like if we embodied this vision? How would we be changed as individuals and communities by drawing closer to Jesus and growing in our zeal to announce Him to the world? The riches of Scripture, the Catholic tradition, the lives of the saints, and the recent magisterium can help us meditate on what we need to love Jesus and share His love with others. Here, I want to suggest three things that seem to be especially important at this time. Think of them as three priorities we should direct our attention and resources toward, both as individuals and as a diocese. Most importantly, they are paths of conversion intended to help us grow in unity with the Lord and with one another, becoming the leaven the world needs.

I. Form Missionary Disciples

We often think of ourselves as believers, but the Lord invites us to become disciples – that is, people who love Him with all their heart, soul and mind. Jesus called and formed His disciples by drawing them unto Himself and growing into an intimate relationship. The Gospels often point out the difference between the crowd who listened to Jesus’s preaching occasionally and the men and women who followed him closely, letting their whole lives be transformed by their encounter with Him. Similarly, we too need to let ourselves be immersed in the relationship with Jesus. It is not a matter of adding some obligations to our busy schedules, but of letting Christ permeate and redeem every aspect of our existence. This transformation that Jesus brings fills us with the passion and certainty necessary to announce Him to others in our personal, family, social, and even professional lives. But all of this requires conversion. Welcoming the Lord into our hearts, families and communities requires self-sacrifice and commitment. We need to turn away from the self-centered and worldly mentality that often seeps into our lives, so that we may have space for practices and relationships that renew God’s grace in us and allow us to know, love and serve Him more. The Church is called to be an “ark of salvation sailing through the waters of history and a beacon that illumines the dark nights of this world… not so much through the magnificence of her structures or the grandeur of her buildings… but rather through the holiness of her members.”^[3] Let us invest our time and resources in becoming missionary disciples, people who draw close to Jesus, experience the fullness of life that comes from His healing grace, and want to share such fullness with everybody.

II. Become the Family of God

Jesus invites all people to discover that they are beloved sons and daughters of God. Thus, the Church is called to become the family of God where we encounter, experience, and are transformed by Christ’s love for us. “As I have loved you, so you also should love one another” (John 13:34). Such love changes the entirety of a person’s life and, by God’s grace, spurs us to renew all relationships. As St. Paul teaches, we are “no longer strangers and aliens” but are “citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God” (Ephesians 2:19). We who are members of Christ’s Body must become the living stones that make up God’s household. In the family of God, people forgive each other to repair fractured relationships, are humble and willing to listen to one another, and take concrete steps to be a sign of unity and communion. Families live as a domestic church, where parents transmit the faith to their children through their words and actions. They help create a soil that opens their children’s hearts to God and allows their vocation as Christian disciples to grow. Parishes welcome, nourish and enable all people to experience belonging, healing and connection that overcome the barriers the world builds around class, race, nationality and language. Faith formation programs, youth groups, Catholic schools and campus ministries take people’s desires and questions seriously and accompany them in their journey toward authentic freedom and happiness through the encounter with Christ. The whole Church transforms into the community of “those who are in harmony with their brothers and sisters and who love their neighbor.”^[4] To become the family of God, though, we need to move away from a passive consumer mentality that delegates personal responsibility and views the Church exclusively as a place we go to get something out of it for ourselves. Instead, we are called by God to take ownership of our journey of faith and the formation of those entrusted to our care, to be hosts in the Church rather than simply guests, and to serve rather than only to be served. If we live the Church as an extension of our families, the way we think of our time, talent and treasure changes because we put them entirely at the service of Christ’s call. Instead of assuming that the needs of the most vulnerable among us are being addressed by someone else, our hearts will be moved by the desire to know that our beloved brothers and sisters in need are taken care of. As we become knit together by loving relationships that move us to serve, we will take greater ownership of our parish ministries, on the one hand, and of Catholic Charities and Catholic Relief Services, on the other. Let us free ourselves of a vision rooted in scarcity in which we give only what is left over or what might return benefits to ourselves personally and realize that each person “has received a gift” and should “use it to serve one another as good stewards of God’s varied grace” instead (1 Peter 4:10).

III. Go Out to Proclaim the Gospel

“As the Father has sent me, so I send you” (John 20:21). Jesus’s commission is not for a select few. By virtue of baptism, every Catholic shares in Jesus’s prophetic mission and is called to proclaim the Gospel with both words and actions. The gift of a close intimacy with the Lord and the task of spreading the Good News are inseparable. Salvation is never exclusively a matter for the individual, nor is it mainly about seeking refuge for the self. The road to salvation leads us necessarily into the lives of others as humble and joyful witnesses who want to say to the world: “Look to Christ! Come closer to Him! Welcome His Word that enlightens and consoles! Listen to His offer of love and become His one family: in the one Christ, we are one.”^[5] Words are not enough, though. “This is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). It is the splendor of lives formed by charity – filled and ordered by the unconditional love of Jesus that heals and transforms us – that draws people to the faith. Men and women filled with love of God and love of neighbor, bearers of the light of the Gospel in all places: this is what our society desperately needs today. Jesus calls us to be a counter witness to the world’s values. Too often we have been formed by the world’s ways and algorithms in social media and cable news that cancel “them” rather than seek the other in love. We are summoned to break away from the polarized and adversarial mindset our culture is enamored with, to show joy and peace amidst challenges and suffering, to live out a commitment to each person’s sacred dignity, and to exhibit the virtues made possible by the gift of the Holy Spirit. Let us proclaim the Gospel with our entire lives. Let us turn our communities into a place of support for those who bear witness to their faith in the world. Let us structure all our offices and ministries to enable missionary disciples to go out and be more present in all parts of our large diocese and among those in need.