Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Vatican City (Fides Service) - Only through a passionate love for Christ is it possible to transmit the Gospel in an effective and convincing manner. This has been the realisation of men and women involved in missionary work. It cannot be otherwise. The Gospel itself is a call to love and a proposal of love offered by Christ himself. We who are sent to announce it cannot convey its meaning unless we experience and share that love within ourselves.
In the heart of every missionary must burn a fire which moves him to proclaim the Lord. It is te same love which the prophet Jeremiah speaks about: “I would say to myself, ‘I will not think about him, I will not speak his name anymore’, but there seemed to be a fire burning in my heart, imprisoned in my bones...’ (Jeremiah 20:9). The love of the Lord is the animator of every missionary; it is the source from which all missionary endeavors flow. Apart from this love, all effort to proclaim the Gospel is drudgery and onerous work.
The love of the Lord is the substance of the Gospel. It is a love than overflows into joyful service. The Gospel is a demand to be “holy as our heavenly Father is holy” (cf Mt 5:48). This is a demand which is difficult to translate into the language of today’s world. Yet the call to holiness is also the call to love and love is the deepest longing of every human being. In the face of a love that totally abandons self for the sake of the beloved, the modern world is forced to re-examine its values and to question its priorities. In the face of a love that values the sick, the poor, the weak and the excluded, the world is forced to ask whether it has missed on something more essential that its worship of self.
Christ draws us to himself in a face-to-face encounter where nothing comes between him and ourselves. It is a love that seeks no other good but the beloved; all other motives recede in the background as superficial and base. The world which views all relationships as an exchange of goods, clings on to a concept of love as transaction. i.e., as a means to obtain something from a person, rather than a way of bestowing oneself to another. Confronted with unconditional love the world pauses to ponder over its manner of loving.
The world knows God as give of gifts. It believes in God as provider of all that we ask. It recognises the love of God in terms of answered prayers and fulfilled desires. The Gospel brings to us a deeper appreciation of God who loves us in the way he wants us to love him: “No one who prefers mother or father to me is worthy of me. No one who prefers son or daughter to me is worthy of me. Anyone who does not take up his cross to follow in my footsteps is not worthy of me. Anyone who finds his life will lose it; anyone who loses his life for my sake will find it. (Mt 10:37-39).
The challenge of every missionary is to articulate this message in a way that can be understood by the world. There is no way it can be articulated except to live it in one’s own life. (Cardinal Ricardo Vidal, Archbishop of Cebu) (Fides Service 7/2/2005 words 610 lines 46)
