From our Pastor’s heart 9/28/25

For three years, Christ’s disciples shared life with Him. They lived with Him, roamed Israel with Him, shared meals with Him. They heard Him speak and teach and do miracles. They saw Him cry over Jerusalem and talk about the reality of the Cross, which filled them with quite a bit of confusion. Some of His Apostles saw the beauty of His divinity shine forth at the Transfiguration and then saw the beauty of his countenance marred by the ugliness of sin during His Passion. After His resurrection, He appeared to Mary Magdalene, His Apostles, and finally to the rest of His disciples, continuing the communion He had perpetuated at the Last Supper, completed in His sacrifice on the Cross, and then shared in perpetuity in His Resurrection and in the life of the Church. Mary, His Blessed Mother, shared in a deep communion with Christ from the moment of His Incarnation. The People of Israel, before that, saw the splendor of God shine forth as recounted through all of the Old Testament.

Christ, before He ascended to His Father, called His eleven Apostles together – those that had most intimately shared in His life on earth – and told them “all authority in heaven and on earth, he said, has been given to me; 19 you, therefore, must go out, making disciples of all nations, and baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all the commandments which I have given you. And behold, I am with you all through the days that are coming, until the consummation of the world.” After worship of God and providing a life of prayer– which is truly right and just and for the glory of God and the good of His Church – the first role of the parish is to make sure that parishioners know the fullness of the Catholic Faith and from that share with everyone they meet the fullness of what God gives to us. Evangelizing means sharing the Faith. Have you ever had two friends who don’t know each other, and you think, Gosh, I wish I could get them together, they will totally hit it off. You love Jesus; you love your friends - why wouldn’t you want them to meet? That is evangelization. This first and foremost happens in families. Moms and dads, you are the ones who first invite your children into friendship with the Lord by your example. Your children see you going to Confession and praying at Mass and at home, and think that maybe having a friendship with God matters. They see you reading the Scriptures; even if you don’t ‘get it,’ and think, maybe there is something there. That this friendship with Christ is actually the most important friendship that mom or dad (and especially dad!) has in their life.

To evangelize often, too, you have to actually have words to tell someone why it would be good for them to respond to that friendship that Jesus wants with them. This is where I (or any priest) can’t do that for you. I don’t know your friends or neighbors. I don’t know their histories of their joys and sorrows. You do! And it doesn’t take a theology degree to do this. At one point, I was on an exercise bike at the gym, and what hooked one of my friends was when I said, “All I can say is that my life is better with Jesus than without him.” This woman, who was in her 70s and had tattoos from her neck to her knuckles, was baptized the next Easter Vigil!

Each of us may have a story of a little phrase like this. In our listening sessions, we will have the opportunity to share these encounters of friendship with the Lord and how deepening our understanding of the knowledge of the Faith has helped us grow in that friendship with Him, too!