HOMILY FOR WORLD MISSION SUNDAY

For most of us growing up in the Catholic Church, the “idea” of the “missions” was something that we thought about “at a distance.”  Missionaries were priests, brother and sisters who were sent by their religious orders to far away places “to convert, to spread the Gospel and to minister to their populations in ‘missionary lands’.”  Unless we felt “called” to this kind of missionary vocation, we never expected to meet or encounter the missions “up close and personal.”

Regularly, missionaries come to our parishes, and we take up special collections “for the missions” and over the years, your prayers and contributions have sustained priests, religious and lay pastoral leaders in more than 1,100 mission dioceses in Asia, Africa, the Pacific Islands, and parts of Latin America and Europe as they proclaim the Gospel, build the Church, and serve the poor.

During his papacy, our Holy Father Pope Francis has often spoken of the Catholic Church as a “missionary Church” and has encouraged all of us to consider ourselves as “missionary disciples.”  For him, the “missions” are not simply some “far-away places” but, rather, are as near to us as the Lord Jesus Christ himself.

This year, in his “Message for World Mission Sunday,” Pope Francis has reminded us of the words of the Lord Jesus Christ spoken before his Ascension and quoted in the Acts of the Apostles, “You shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and shall be my witnesses … to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8).”  He has made that the theme of this years “World Mission Sunday.”

As baptized Catholics, we are all called to a “missionary vocation,” to be “missionary disciples” because we are all called by our baptism to be “his witnesses … to the ends of the earth.”

While “missionary lands” still exist with tremendous needs and we are asked to give our generous support, the whole Church is missionary by its very nature.  “I continue to dream,” our Holy Father writes, “of a completely missionary Church, and a new era of missionary activity among Christian communities. I repeat Moses’ great desire for the people of God on their journey: “Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets!” (Num 11:29). Indeed, would that all of us in the Church were what we already are by virtue of baptism: prophets, witnesses, missionaries of the Lord, by the power of the Holy Spirit, to the ends of the earth!”

Every baptized Catholic is asked to bear witness to Christ, to participate in a mission of universal evangelization, and to seek strength and guidance from the Holy Spirit.

We accomplish that goal in our prayers, in our words and in our lived deeds. To apply an old cliché to our missionary nature and reality as a Church, “don’t just tell me that you love me … show me!” These are the ways we “bear witness” to the Lord Jesus Christ who draws us all into a spirit of “missionary discipleship.”  These are the ways we identify and become one with those missionaries who “go out to all the world to spread the Good News.”

When you contribute to the World Mission Sunday collection, you make it possible for the Holy Father to provide for the formation of our seminarians and religious men and women. You assist in building the schools and orphanages that care for children in places few visit. Missionaries can build churches in areas with scarce resources because of you. Priests and religious Brothers and Sisters can buy food and the bare essentials that make it possible to proclaim the Gospel and celebrate the Sacraments because of you.

Today, as we celebrate the 200^th anniversary of the establishment of the world-wide Fund for the Propagation of the Faith, let’s all join in the Church’s missionary works.  “We are the Lord’s witnesses to the ends of the earth.”  Let’s not just tell him that we love and serve him.  Let’s show him.