[Click here for the readings.]<\/a><\/strong><\/em><\/p>\nThis Sunday, we mark Catechetical Sunday \u2013 an opportunity to celebrate, pray for and bless those men and women who use their time, their talent and their love to teach the faith.<\/p>\n
If you think you have a good idea of who these people are, think again.<\/p>\n
About 10 years ago, my wife and I were on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land.\u00a0 And one of the women on our trip was a new convert.\u00a0 She had joined the Church at Easter, just a few months before.\u00a0 I was curious about what led her to convert; she wasn\u2019t married, none of her family was Catholic, and she was from the Deep South, where Catholics don\u2019t exactly grow on trees.\u00a0 So on one of our long bus trips, I asked her, \u201cWhat made you want to become Catholic?\u201d<\/p>\n
What she said surprised me \u2013 and moved me.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was my boss,\u201d she said.\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cHe\u2019s a Catholic.\u00a0 And he\u2019s one of the kindest people I know.\u00a0 He\u2019s just a good, good man.\u00a0 I saw how he treated his family, his wife, his children, how he dealt so fairly and decently with everyone.\u00a0 And he was happy.\u201d\u00a0 And she told me:\u00a0 \u201cThe more I got to know him, the more I wanted what he had.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s stayed with me ever since.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wanted what he had.\u201d<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve thought about that from time to time and wondered: would anyone ever say something like that about me?<\/p>\n
Would my life and example ever have that kind of an impact on someone?<\/p>\n
And this particular Sunday, I realize: whether he knew it or not, that young woman\u2019s boss was a catechist.\u00a0 He was passing on the faith, teaching it, just by the way he lived.<\/p>\n
Which brings me to my broader point: if you want to know the most important catechists in this parish, just look around you.<\/p>\n
In fact, just look in the mirror.<\/p>\n
Because every one of us is a catechist.<\/p>\n
Every one of us, by virtue of our baptism, is charged with proclaiming the gospel.<\/p>\n
Every one of us is bearing witness.\u00a0 We are teaching.\u00a0 We may not do it with a lesson plan or textbooks.\u00a0 We may not all explain the sacraments to children in a classroom.<\/p>\n
But we live out the sacraments we have received in the classroom of the world.<\/p>\n
Every one of us is teaching the faith.<\/p>\n
So we need to ask ourselves: what am I teaching?<\/p>\n
Am I showing compassion?<\/p>\n
Am I modeling patience? Sacrifice? Prayer?\u00a0 Fidelity to the faith?<\/p>\n
Am I teaching others how to love as Christ did?<\/p>\n
Or, am I teaching something else?<\/p>\n
Am I being pious on Sunday, then petty on Monday?<\/p>\n
Am I living the faith that I received \u2013 or merely going through the motions?<\/p>\n
As I learned from that young woman on our pilgrimage, what we choose to do, or choose not to do, can have a profound effect \u2013 on ourselves, and on those around us, in ways we might not even imagine.<\/p>\n
St. Paul\u2019s letter today couldn\u2019t be more clear:<\/p>\n
\u201cConduct yourselves,\u201d he writes, \u201cin a way worthy of the gospel of Christ.\u201d<\/p>\n
In other words, make the gospel present to others.\u00a0 Make Christ<\/em> present.\u00a0 As Paul puts it: \u201cChrist will be magnified in my body.\u201d<\/p>\nThe writer M. Craig Barnes put it beautifully.\u00a0 \u201cGod is always present,\u201d he wrote, \u201cbut not usually apparent.\u201d<\/p>\n
Our mission, our calling, our vocation as Catholic Christians is to make God apparent in the world.\u00a0 To let others see Him through us.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s part of our calling, as well, as members of this faith community.\u00a0 This weekend, Our Lady Queen of Martyrs marks the celebration of our parish feast \u2013 and the beginning of a year-long celebration of our centennial.\u00a0 For a century, generations called this church their spiritual home and worked to \u201cmake God apparent in the world.\u201d\u00a0 And their legacy has now become ours.<\/p>\n
The catechists we pray for this morning are a key part of that legacy \u2013 they are the ones who are most visibly passing on the faith to our children and grandchildren, sacrificing their time to hand on what they know and love.\u00a0 They\u2019re helping to insure that decades from now this church will still be filled as it is today \u2013 that more voices will be raised in song, that more hearts will be lifting their prayers and petitions to God from these pews, that new members of the Body of Christ will come forward to share the Eucharistic banquet, long after we are gone.<\/p>\n
But those teachers of the faith aren\u2019t the only ones.\u00a0\u00a0 It is also up to each one of us.<\/p>\n
This Catechetical Sunday, let us recommit ourselves to our vocation as teachers of the faith \u2013 the vocation marked on each of us at our baptism.<\/p>\n
Let us vow to proclaim the Good News, to be heralds of the gospel, to be messengers of healing and hope.<\/p>\n
We need to strive, very simply, to make our lives examples of what it means to be a Catholic Christian:<\/p>\n
To love without conditions. To pray without ceasing.\u00a0 To be compassion and mercy in a world full of desperation and fear.<\/p>\n
In short: let us live to magnify Christ<\/em>, and to make God apparent<\/em>.<\/p>\nIf we do that, who knows?<\/p>\n
Maybe someone might one day even say of us:<\/p>\n
\u201cI want what they have.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"[Click here for the readings.] This Sunday, we mark Catechetical Sunday \u2013 an opportunity to celebrate, pray for and bless those men and women who use their time, their talent and their love to teach the faith. If you think you have a good idea of who these people are, think again. About 10 years […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":132,"featured_media":74224,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-74223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-homilies"],"yoast_head":"\n
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