The Church Doesn’t Have A Mission The Mission Has A Church
2023년 10월 22일The Church Doesn’t Have A Mission
The Mission Has A Church
< Mission Sunday >
Most Catholics have a very narrow (and often incorrect) idea of what missioners do. Some think we go overseas to force Catholicism on others. We used to do that. For hundreds of years. But then we’d look at the cultures of the New World and realize, we gave them religion but we didn’t give them the Gospel. Even “Christian” Europe turned being Catholic into a culture instead of a way of life. We knew something was terribly wrong when Catholic Hutus and Catholic Tutsis in Africa murdered one other during the Rwanda-Burundi war. Today the Church celebrates Mission Sunday in an effort to rekindle the zeal for our faith. We need to start fresh. You don’t need to go to the other side of the world to be a Missioner. You can go to the other side of this church. Or your house.
Fr. Richard Rohr said, in Israel, Jesus and the early “church” offered people an experience of God; it moved to Greece, where it became a philosophy. When it moved to Rome and Constantinople, it became organized religion. Then it spread to Europe, and it became a culture. Finally, it moved to North America and became a business! Can we save Catholicism from just becoming a business and once again offer people an experience of God? Will you be God’s Missioner?