The Joy of the Gospel

Jesus, I trust in you!

There is a sense of urgency in the sending of the disciples to preach about the coming of the Kingdom of God: Go on your way, I am sending you like lambs among wolves. By commanding the disciples to bring neither money bag, nor sack, nor sandals, the Lord wanted them to travel light. “Greet no one along the way” so that nothing can delay them from fulfilling their task. Perhaps you have seen those trucks that bore the signs “Government project: do not delay.” The mission to evangelize is something like that. Each of us is sent to evangelize: God’s project: do not delay.”

I suppose that this sense of urgency springs from the importance of the message we are supposed to bring to others: “The Kingdom of God is at hand for you.” The coming of the Kingdom of God is indeed important because it is the means by which God gives all men access to his divine life. The Father wants all of us to share in his divine life. That is why he gathers men around his Son and this gathering is the Church which on earth is the beginning of the Kingdom of God. The Lord wants to gather us all in the Church so that we might have life: “Oh, that you may suck fully of the milk of her comfort, that you may nurse with delight at her abundant breasts! For thus says the Lord: Lo, I will spread prosperity over Jerusalem like a river, and the wealth of the nations like an overflowing torrent. As nurslings, you shall be carried in her arms, and fondled in her lap; as a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you; in Jerusalem you shall find your comfort.” The Lord uses the tender image of a mother nursing her child in order to reveal to us the tenderness of his love which desires nothing but goodness for all of us. The Lord comforts us through the Church which is the new Jerusalem. We should always consider the Church as our mother.  (Because of the popularity of receiving communion by the hand, the reception of communion on the tongue is unappreciated by many. I find this unfortunate because receiving Communion on the tongue reminds us of the time when as little children, we were fed by the hand of our mothers. This manner of receiving Communion expresses the motherly gesture of the Church.)

The tenderness of a mother’s love always brings delight. It brings joy because it is life giving. A person who experienced a mother’s love grows and finds fulfillment. In the same way, we who experienced the love of God through the Church grow to maturity and eventually we seek means to fulfillment. The challenge to go and evangelize gives us the opportunity to find real fulfillment. “The Gospel offers us the chance to live life on a higher plane: ‘Life grows by being given away, and it weakens in isolation and comfort. Indeed, those who enjoy life the most are those who leave security on the shore and become excited by the mission of communicating life to others.’ When the Church summons Christians to take up the task of evangelization, she is simply pointing to the source of authentic fulfillment. For ‘here we discover a profound law of reality: that life is attained and matures in the measure that it is offered up in order to give life to others. This is certainly what mission means.’” (Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium, 10.) A loving mother gives life to loving children. Eventually her children become parents themselves. They who have been given life by their mother eventually desire to give life to others. This is precisely what evangelization is all about: it is about the passing on of a life-giving tradition. I have been given life. Now, I want to give life to others. I have been given joy. Now, I want to pass on this joy to others. “Consequently, an evangelizer must never look like someone who has just come back from a funeral! Let us recover and deepen our enthusiasm, that ‘delightful and comforting joy of evangelizing, even when it is in tears that we must sow…And may the world of our time, which is searching, sometimes in anguish, sometimes with hope, be enabled to receive the good news not from evangelizers who are dejected, impatient or anxious, but from ministers of the Gospel whose lives glow with fervor, who have first received the joy of Christ.’” (Ibid.)

O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.