Never shrinking back

Good News Reflection
Tuesday of the Seventh Week of Easter
May 18, 2010

Day 5 of the Novena to the Holy Spirit

Today's Readings:
Acts 20:17-27
Ps 68:10-11, 20-21 (with 33a)
John 17:1-11a
http://www.usccb.org/nab/051810.shtml
USCCB Podcast of the Readings:
http://ccc.usccb.org/cccradio/NABPodcasts/10_05_18.mp3

Never shrinking back

"Never did I shrink from telling you what was for your own good.... I take the blame for no one's conscience, for I have never shrunk from announcing to you God's design in its entirety" – the words of St. Paul to his spiritual children in Ephesus as he neared the end of his life (from today's first reading).

"I have made your name known to those you gave me out of the world.... I entrusted to them the message you entrusted to me." – the words of Jesus to the Father as he neared the end of his life (from today's Gospel reading).

Will you be able to say the same thing at the end of your life?

We live in a very "polite" society. We hide the truth for the sake of being "nice." We allow others to violate the truth for the sake of being "politically correct." But Jesus gave us the Holy Spirit so that we could be his witnesses to the ends of the earth, sometimes by words, always by the holy way that we live – boldly, visibly, confidently. Jesus was not always polite, and he was certainly not politically correct.

Do we really want him to be our Lord and teacher? Do we really want to follow him and imitate him?

We preach by our lives. We convert by our compassion. And we teach the truth by using words whenever there's a hunger for understanding. If a person is ready to be taught, we must be ready to explain our faith and not shrink back.

Usually, we don't know when someone's ready, so we must rely upon the Holy Spirit to inspire us. Never are we to sit back and hope that someone else will do the evangelizing, or else at the time of our death we will be held accountable for the poorly formed consciences of others and for the souls who never reach heaven.

How many times have we noticed coworkers struggling with a problem and we've not asked if we could pray for them? When have we heard a family member complain about a Church teaching and we've let our silence – or perhaps even a smile or nod – indicate that we agree, rather than dare to offer a different perspective (in a compassionate way, of course)? When did we see a stranger in the pew next to us at Mass who seemed unhappy and we didn't reach out to show that we cared?

Every day, we encounter opportunities to evangelize. Today, make it your special assignment to watch for such opportunities. Try counting them. Jot them down in a notebook. At the end of the day, put a plus-sign by each incident in which you made an effort to give witness to Christ and a minus-sign by the times you forgot or held back. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you improve. Start the next morning with a decision, made out loud to God, to rely on his supernatural power so that you be a good witness of true faith.

Perhaps there's something that can help you with this at Catholic Digital Resources. See these evangelization aids:
http://catholicdr.com/evangelaids/index.html

© 2010 by Terry A. Modica
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