Saints and Popes Speak on Mission
Our Gospel reading today presents the beginning of the famous “mission discourse” by the Evangelist Matthew; it covers all of chapter ten of Matthew’s Gospel. Since our Catholic Church is missionary by her very nature and identity, much has been written about missionary evangelization over the centuries. To enhance your meditation and reflection, this presentation simply provides a series of quotes from various sources to enrich your missionary journey of faith.
► “The task of evangelizing all people constitutes the essential mission of the Church…. Evangelizing is in fact the grace and vocation proper to the Church, her deepest identity. She exists in order to evangelize.” Saint Pope Paul VI (EN 14). ► “The Mission of Christ the Redeemer, which is entrusted to the Church, is still very far from completion…. This mission is still only beginning … we must commit ourselves wholeheartedly to its service.” Saint Pope John Paul II (RM 1).
► “An evangelizer must never look like someone who has just come back from a funeral.” Pope Francis (EG 10). ► “Go forth and set the world on fire.” Saint Ignatius of Loyola. ► “Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.” Pope Benedict XVI (DCE 1). ► “It is no use walking somewhere to preach unless our walking is our preaching.” Saint Francis of Assisi.
► “Consult not your fears but your hopes and dreams. Think not about your frustrations, but about your unfulfilled potential. Concern yourself not with what you tried and failed in, but with what is still possible for you to do.” Saint Pope John XXIII. ► “Intense love does not measure, it just gives.” Saint Teresa of Calcutta. ► “Modern people listen more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if they listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses.” Saint Pope Paul VI (EN 41). ► “Speak to them of the great mercy of God.” Saint Francis Xavier.
► “Remember that nothing is small in the eyes of God. Do all that you do with love.” Saint Thérèse of Lisieux. ► “We have been called to heal wounds, to unite what has fallen apart, and to bring home those who have lost their way.” Saint Francis of Assisi. ► “I invite all Christians, everywhere, at this very moment, to a renewed personal encounter with Jesus Christ, or at least an openness to letting him encounter them; I ask all of you to do this unfailingly each day.” Pope Francis (EG 3).
► “I would be a missionary, not for a few years only, but from the beginning of creation until the consummation.” Saint Thérèse of Lisieux. ► “My vocation is love, in the heart of the Church, my mother; I will be love and then I will be all things.” Saint Thérèse of Lisieux. ► “Proclaim Christ to all peoples.” Saint Pope John Paul II (RM 3).
James H. Kroeger, M.M.
Mission / Father’s Day
Send me, Lord, out into the world
that begins at my front door.
May my every word flow from your heart
and my actions be of love and peace
that everything I do or say
reflects your great mercy to all.
Help me witness to your truth
no less in my silence than in my words
and show me, Lord, the way I should go.
Help me to see that my solemn duty
to spread your gospel to everyone
in the world is second only to their right
to hear and respond to it.
Open my eyes to your presence in others
and my ears to recognize your voice
especially in the poor and oppressed.
Unworthy as I am, I dare to come
before you, my Lord, in answer to your call
to spread your love and mercy to all.
Grant that I have the wisdom
to get out of your way so that whatever
good I do or hardship I endure
will redound to your glory.
Amen.
Prayer by Father Joe Veneroso, M.M.
