Trends in Mission

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Trends in Mission
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Two Preliminary Considerations

• RM 2 Missionary Activity is a matter for all
  Christians, for all dioceses and parishes, Church
  institutions and associations.
• RM 41 Mission is a single but complex reality,
  and it develops in a variety of ways.
• Different Elements of Mission
• 1. Proclamation and Catechesis
• 2. Witness
• 3. Dialogue
• 4. Human Liberation
• 5. Prayer and Contemplation

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Mission as Proclamation
Proclamation is the foundation, summit and
center of evangelization (Dialogue and
Proclamation 10)
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Mission as Proclamation
Proclamation is the permanent priority of
mission. (Redemptoris Missio 44)
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Proclaim the gospel in prophetic witness and
proclamation Paul VI There is no true
evangelization if the name, The teaching, the
life of Jesus of Nazareth are not proclaimed.
(EN 22)
Two aspects of Evangelization
Not only announce but also denounce --
culture of death, aspects of culture,
justice--- 1971 Synod Action on behalf of
justicea constitutive part of preaching the
gospel.
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Mission as Proclamation

• Bosch a bold humility!
• We do have something to say, to offer! People
  need the gospel!
• We need to speak boldly the truth of Jesus Christ
• We need to speak boldly against injustices to
  people and land
• We need to proclaim with confidence that God has
  entrusted the message of reconciliation to us
  (2Cor 519)

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Recently, two passages from St. Paul
1 Thessalonians 21-8
1 Corinthians 916, 19-23
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1 Thessalonians 21-8 You yourselves know,
brothers and sisters, that our coming to you was
not in vain as you know we had courage in our
God to declare to you the gospel of God in spite
of great opposition. For our appeal does not
spring from deceit or impure motives or trickery,
but just as we have been approved by God to be
entrusted with the message of the gospel, even so
we speak, not to please mortals . . . . But we
were gentle among you, like a nurse tenderly
caring for her own children. So deeply do we care
for you that we are determined to share with you
not only the gospel of God but also our very own
selves, because you have become very dear to us.
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1 Corinthians 916, 19-23 woe to me if I do
not proclaim the gospel! For though I am free
with respect to all, I have made myself a slave
to all, so that I might win more of them. To the
Jews I became as a Jew, in order to win Jews. To
those under the Law I became as one under the law
. . . so that I might win those under the Law.
To the weak I became weak. I have become all
things to all people, that I might by all means
save some. I do it all for the sake of the
gospel, so that I may share its blessings.
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Mission as Witness

• The first means of evangelization is the
  witness of an authentically Christian life (EN
  41)

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The churchs greatest problem today is that its
witness does not measure up to its teaching it
does not always practice what it preaches.
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MISSION AS WITNESS
Modern women and men listen more willingly to
witnesses than to teachers, and if they do listen
to teachers, it is because they are witnesses
(EN 41)
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WITNESS

• The missionary who, despite all his or her human
  limitations and defects, lives a simple life,
  taking Christ as the model, is a sign of God and
  of transcendent realities. But everyone in the
  Church, striving to imitate the Divine master,
  can and must bear this kind of witness In many
  cases it is the only possible way of being a
  missionary. (RM 42)

• Personal

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MISSION AS WITNESS

• Communal
• community is mission
• Take a handful of Christians who, in the midst
  of their own communities, show their capacity for
  understanding and acceptance, their sharing of
  life and destiny with other people, their
  solidarity with the efforts of all for whatever
  is noble and good Why are they like this? Why do
  they live in this way? Such a witness is already
  a silent proclamation of the Good News and a very
  powerful and effective one. Here we have an
  initial act of evangelization.
• (EN 21)
• 
  

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WITNESS

• Institutional
• church-sponsored institutions schools, hospitals
• The need for collective witness is precisely in
  this that the strength of a Catholic school
  should lie it is a challenge it has to face We
  have to work together and cooperate as a school
  community. It is as a community we have to embody
  and bear witness to our way of looking at life,
  our scale of values, our aim in formation, our
  Christian freedom and joy.
• 
  (Karl Mueller, SVD)

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• A greater harmony between the mission we do and
  the life we live is crucial. He goes on to say
  that often the split or the lack of harmony,
  between these two dimensions of our SVD calling
  leads either to a crisis that undermines our
  vocation or to an attitude of mediocrity that
  compromises our witness to Gods Kingdom.
• Fr. Superior General Antonio Pernia, SVD

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Mission as Dialogue
Proclamation presupposes and requires a
dialogue method in order to respond to the
requirements of those to be evangelized and to
enable them to interiorize the message received.
(Marcello Zago)
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What is Dialogue?
It is the norm of every form of Christian
mission whether one speaks of simple presence and
witness, service or direct proclamation. Any
sense of mission not permeated by such a
dialogical spirit would go against the demands of
true humanity and against the teachings of the
Gospel (Dialogue and Mission, no. 836)
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We should do mission today through dialogue with

• Respect
• Openness
• Willingness to learn
• Attentiveness
• Vulnerability
• Hospitality
• Humility
• Evangelical mentality
• The Church proposes she imposes nothing (RM 39)

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This translates into

• Learning the language
• Bonding with the local people
• Respecting and studying the culture
• Learning about the local religions
• Connecting with other religious leaders
• Coming with our cups half empty

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Mission as Dialogue

• Just as God is dialogical in Godself and in the
  world . . .
• So the church needs to give of itself in service
  to the world
• So the church needs to learn from the world, its
  cultures, its religionsand so learn more about
  Gods unfathomable riches
• Just as Gods missionary presence is never about
  imposition but about persuasion and freedom . . .
• So must the church never impose, but emphasize
  witness, and proclamation as an answer to a
  question

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Mission as Dialogue

• Just as God humbled Godself in the incarnation
• So the church needs to do mission not out of
  superiority, but in humility and vulnerability
• In fact, missionaries of the future will not come
  from rich, dominating countries
• Church of the future will be poor
• Will do mission out of poverty

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John Paul II Mission Sunday Message 2002
The main road of mission is sincere dialogue.
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Living out and proclaiming the Good News of the
Gospel
So Mission is always done in dialogue, but it
must also be a real evangelization.
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Evangelization and Human Liberation

• David Bosch said that
• the relationship between the evangelistic and
  the societal dimensions of the Christian mission
  constitutes one of the thorniest areas in the
  theology and practice of mission.

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Evangelization Human Liberation

• In EN 31, Pope Paul VI provides three reasons for
  the close links between evangelization and human
  liberation.
• First, there is a connection in the
  anthropological order humans are not abstract
  beings but persons subject to economic and social
  factors.
• Second, there is a connection in the theological
  order Gods plan of creation cannot be isolated
  from Gods plan of redemption which requires the
  establishment of justice.
• And finally, there is a connection in the order
  of charity the Good News cannot be proclaimed
  effectively unless it promotes justice and peace.
  

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Evangelization Human Liberation

• As regards the question as to How should the
  relationship be understood in terms of priority?
• Paul VI in EN 34 affirms the primacy of
  evangelization over human liberation and says
  the church proclaims liberation and cooperates
  with all those who are suffering on its behalf.
  She affirms that primacy of her spiritual
  function and refuses to substitute for the
  preaching of the kingdom of God a proclamation
  of liberation of the merely human order. She
  declares that her advocacy of liberation would
  not be complete or perfect if she failed to
  preach salvation in Jesus Christ.

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Prayer and Contemplation
The missionary must be a contemplative in
action. (Redemptoris Missio 91)
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Prayer and Contemplation

• Relate to the world on a deeper level of
  attention (W. Teasdale)
• To see the world through Gods eyes
• allows one at once to acknowledge ones own
  woundsand to learn to wait, watch, and listen.
  (R. Schreiter)

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Prayer and Litrugy
The church lives from the center with its eyes
on the borders. (Robert Hawkins)
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Prayer and Litrugy
The church in mission has two eyes, one always
looking at Jesus, the other at the world Only
when the two eyes are opened, will reality be
seen clearly and in its full dimension.
(Archbishop Antonio Tagle)
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Conclusion Mission in Many Modes

• Mission is a multifaceted ministry, in respect
  of witness, service, justice, healing,
  reconciliation, liberation, peace, evangelism,
  fellowship, church planting, contextualization,
  and much more. (TM 512)

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Question

• Which of the five aspects of mission
  (proclamation, witness, dialogue, human
  development, prayer and liturgy) do you think is
  least evident in the church as it goes about its
  mission in your country or region today? What
  problems does this cause?