By Fr. Roy Cimagala *
CHRIST’S redemptive mission is very much an ongoing affair,
and he involves all of us actually in this business. Those words that
he addressed to his apostles, giving them their mission, can be
considered as addressed to us also.
“The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few,” he said,
“so ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his
harvest.” (Lk 10,2) The task, of course, is overwhelming and we are
asked to give our all. But we should not worry because Christ will
always be with us. It’s his work, after all, before it is ours. We
should just cooperate with him.
In this regard, we have to give special attention to what
may be considered as the new mission lands nowadays where we do not
have to go far to carry out this duty. This can be done right where we
are.
Yes, there is no doubt we are all meant to be apostles of
Christ, to be his ambassadors. That’s simply because we are meant to
be like Christ, to be ‘another Christ,’ and so we share also in his
redemptive mission which is a continuing affair as long as we are
still in this world.
No wonder then that Christ would just choose his apostles
seemingly at random. He would just pass by a certain place, and upon
seeing someone, he would just say, “Come, follow me.” And wonder of
wonders also, the person called would just follow him without
question. In fact, it is said that the person called would leave
everything behind (“relictic omnibus”).
We are all meant to be apostles of Christ with the lifelong
concern for doing apostolate, taking advantage of all the occasions
and situations in life. Vatican II spells it out very clearly. “The
Christian vocation is by its very nature a vocation to the
apostolate.” (Apostolicam actuositatem, 2) So, anyone who wants to be
truly consistent to his Christian identity and calling should realize
ever deeply that he is called to help others get closer to God. This
is what apostolate is all about.
We need to be familiar with this Christian duty. We have to
do apostolate, and we need to see to it that the zeal for it is always
nourished, stoked and fanned to its most intense degree.
We have to understand though that in doing apostolate, we
should rely only on Christ’s power. Thus, Christ in commissioning his
apostles, told them to “take nothing for the journey, neither walking
stick, nor sack, nor food, nor money…” (cfr. Lk 9,1-6) He will provide
for everything that we need.
And nowadays, we seem to get more convinced that the new
mission lands are not anymore those places and people who are far away
from the mainstream, those who still are kind of primitive in their
culture and deprived even of the basic material necessities, or who
are still into their own pagan ways. Of course, due attention and
evangelization should continue for them. These should never stop.
But we are more convinced that the new mission lands are the
more developed countries that are in the middle of the mainstream
world but are very far in their faith. More than far from the faith
and from God, they look more like resistant and even against God and
anything that has to do with religion. They are more challenging since
the attention and evangelization to be given to them require a more
complex strategy.
We have to give special attention to these new mission lands!
* Chaplain Center for Industrial Technology and Enterprise (CITE), Talamban, Cebu City
Email: roycimagala@gmail.com
