When Jesus says in Matthew 10, “Come to me…” He is extending an invitation to everyone. Central to the mission of the Church, from our very first days, has been to help others find Him.
As we do this, the Church’s Evangelizing work (spreading the Gospel and, therefore, drawing others to Christ) must be in response to where people actually are. It is no good just handing out the same old things in the same old way. If the Church is to remain faithful to her calling, if she is to continue speaking in a meaningful way to a rapidly changing world, if she is to keep up with the new knowledge and ideas which change our ways of understanding the world in which we live, she must renew herself constantly in the way she expresses the Gospel message, in the way she structures herself, in the way she communicates the message, and in the way she dialogues with the world. As we have seen over the centuries, the world may not like what the Church has to say, but it should be able to understand it and, we hope, be inspired and enlivened by it.
Let us pray for our Mother, the Church: let us pray for Pope Francis as the focus of unity for Christians everywhere; let us pray for those who, while remaining faithful to the core traditions, are creatively finding new ways to proclaim the message of the Kingdom to people everywhere; let us pray for those places where the Church is working under great difficulties; let us pray for the Church in this time of global pandemic (filled with trials); let us pray for our own parish community that it may truly be both loyal to the faith of our mothers and fathers and have a true missionary spirit to proclaim Christ to all those among whom we live.
Mary, Mother of the Church. Pray for us.
