Day 36
Relationships or Activities?
It is not therefore a matter of inventing a “new program.” The program already exists: it is the plan found in the gospel and in the living Tradition, it is the same as ever. Ultimately, it has its center in Christ himself, who is to be known, loved and imitated, so that in him we may live the life of the Trinity, and with him transform history until its fulfillment in the heavenly Jerusalem.
— St. John Paul II, Novo Millennio Ineunte
The instructions Jesus gave when he sent out the first Christian missionaries included a curious directive: “Whatever town or village you enter, look for a worthy person in it, and stay there until you leave” (Matthew 10:11).
Christian Mission Is about People
The implication is clear: Mission, for a Christian, is primarily about people. The whole history of salvation follows this same pattern. God begins to unfold his plan of redemption by establishing a relationship with the chosen people of Israel, and this relationship becomes the central characteristic of Israel’s very identity. “Ever present in your midst, I will be your God, and you will be my people” (Leviticus 26:12).
Through the Incarnation, God elevates his relationship with us to a shocking new level. By taking on human nature, he enables us to interact with him just as we interact with any human friend: “I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father” (John 15:15).
Original sin shattered a relationship of trust between God and the human family: “Man, tempted by the devil, let his trust in his Creator die in his heart” (CCC, 397). God originally established that relationship to be the source of meaning and joy for human beings: “Man was made to live in communion with God, in whom he finds happiness” (CCC, 45). And so it makes perfect sense that God’s plan for redeeming us from sin involves reestablishing a real, interpersonal relationship with the human family and each member of it, not simply tweaking a damaged social system or repairing a technical malfunction.
The Real Meaning of Religion
Whenever we forget the centrality of relationship in the Christian worldview, we play into the hands of critics and cynics who consider religion to be nothing more than empty rituals and soulless formalities. We all know people who have left the Church because of this. They learned how to make the Sign of the Cross; they learned a few answers to questions in Catechism classes; they learned when to stand and sit and kneel during Mass; but they never experienced a personal encounter with God. Jesus remained for them a shadowy historical figure, not a real person passionately interested in their lives.
Developing a personal relationship with God in the context of a community of believers who make up the family of God — this is the real core of true religion. Making this possible was a central part of the radical, revolutionary message of Jesus Christ.
And so, as we strive to find creative ways to spread that message, we have to give priority to relationships. Otherwise we will end up betraying the very idea we are trying to communicate. Jesus commanded us to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:39). Love means relationship, personal investment, interpersonal knowledge, and mutual esteem. To be Christ’s messengers to the world, his apostles and missionaries, requires us to care enough about the people whom Jesus came to save that we are willing to become vulnerable and enter into relationship with them: “Whatever town or village you enter, look for a worthy person in it, and stay there until you leave” (Matthew 10:11).
Beyond Techniques
Any apostolic activity we engage in should include, or at least be open to, this dimension. Christianity is not a technique that people can learn and apply with clinical precision. Christianity is a network of faith-based relationships that flows outward from a personal encounter with the one, true, Triune God — Father, Son, and Holy Spirit — who is relationship and requires relationship: “Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love” (1 John 4:8). Our apostolic endeavors have to be conceived and executed from that perspective.
Apostolates like camps, schools, Bible studies, service projects, publishing houses, websites, hospitals, professional associations, conferences, radio shows, formation programs, and even whole parishes are never ends in themselves. Rather, every apostolate is an effort to create an environment or situation in which personal encounters with Christ and among actual or potential members of the Body of Christ have a better chance of happening and flourishing. Apostolic activities are meant to be catalysts that initiate or deepen Christian experience, which is always in some way an experience of God and God’s family.
Avoiding a Tricky Idolatry
And so we must resist the temptation to idolize our apostolates, as if the perfect apostolate will be able to conquer evil and usher in a new Golden Age of Christianity. There is no Golden Age, and there never has been. Every period in the history of the Church has had its crises as well as its saints. The age in which we live is no exception. Our Christian mission spurs us on to find creative ways to evangelize, to come up with new apostolates that can expand the reach — both in breadth and in depth — of Christ’s message in our world, but in the end they are merely tools. The real heart of evangelization is found not in perfect pastoral programs or killer apps, which are merely useful instruments, but in relationships of love — love for Christ and love for neighbor.
Pope Benedict XVI put this beautifully in his very first encyclical letter, God Is Love:
Love of neighbor is thus shown to be possible in the way proclaimed by the Bible, by Jesus. It consists in the very fact that, in God and with God, I love even the person whom I do not like or even know. . . . Then I learn to look on this other person not simply with my eyes and my feelings, but from the perspective of Jesus Christ. His friend is my friend.
“His friend is my friend” — this is the heart of apostolic activity. I want to give to others what Jesus has given to me, and I want to do so because Jesus wants me to. Evangelization is never mechanical; it is never technocratic. It is about people, and relationships, and the living God who is present in all of them.
Questions for Personal Reflection or Group Discussion
What idea in this reflection struck you most and why?
Considering the reflections today, what do you think is the best way to evaluate the effectiveness of our apostolic activities?
What would you say to someone who wanted to come up with creative means of evangelization to reach as many people as possible? Could an inspiration like that — so focused on visible results and measurable numbers — come from the Holy Spirit? Why or why not?
Throughout these days, we have explained that apostolic action can take three forms: the priestly form of living our daily activities as an offering to God and thereby as a witness to his goodness; the prophetic form of telling people about Jesus and his message; and the kingly form of working to transform society in accordance with God’s plan.
In your own life, which of those three is in the best condition and why?
What will you do today to make an improvement in the one that needs it most?
- I will seek advice from someone I trust about an aspect of my life I have been uncomfortable with for a while.
- I will bring up religion in a normal conversation and see where it goes.
- I will visit my parish or diocesan website and look for opportunities to volunteer my time in some apostolic activity during the coming weeks.
- (Write your own resolution) I will
Concluding Prayer
Dear Jesus, help me to spread thy fragrance everywhere I go.
Flood my soul with thy spirit and love.
Penetrate and possess my whole being so utterly that all my life may only be a radiance of thine.
Shine through me and be so in me that every soul I come in contact with may feel thy presence in my soul.
Let them look up and see no longer me but only Jesus.
Stay with me and then I shall begin to shine as you shine, so to shine as to be a light to others.
— Prayer of St. Teresa of Calcutta
