"Proclaim the Gospel to Every Creature" (USCCA, Chapter 3)
OPENING PRAYER
God of All Creation, you call each of us to evolve, to recognize that you hold all that is in your loving embrace. As we grow in your love, may we learn to hold others in an ever expanding embrace as well. May we see the entire sweep of history as your self-communication that calls us to awake to who we are in you--and who you are in us. In the mutual embrace that we share, may we together hold the entire cosmos, each and every person, each and every creature, in a way that nurtures and sustains and calls forth the gifts that are given for all. May each of us participate fully in a personal evolution that transforms us and transforms the world. Amen.
—Judy Cannato (d. 2011)
Field of Compassion: How the New Cosmology Is
Transforming Spiritual Life (Notre Dame, IN: Sorin Books, 2010), 114.
"PROCLAIM THE GOSPEL TO EVERY CREATURE (Mk 16:15)"
—CCC, Nos. 74–133
Field of Compassion: How the New Cosmology Is
Transforming Spiritual Life (Notre Dame, IN: Sorin Books, 2010), 114.
Who taught you about the best ways to live, ways that bring life and meaning to you and to others? Was it your parents, grandparents, spouse, family, friends, teachers, journalists and writers, magazines, television and movies, the web? What ways have you tried? Have any worked for you?
God “wills everyone to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth” (1 Tm 2:4). Jesus says, “I came that they might have life and have it more abundantly” (Jn 10:10). What truths have you learned from the Church—the People of God—and from Sacred Scripture about the ways that God has revealed and calls us to live so that we may all experience the abundant life and salvation promised by God? We can trust these promises because God can neither deceive nor be deceived (CCC, no. 156).
Jesus Christ is God’s fullness of Revelation by his teaching, witness, death, and Resurrection. Jesus is the “Way, the Truth, and the Life” (Jn 14:6). Jesus, as the revealed Word of God, is a source of saving truth and a moral pathway for everyone.
Through Apostolic Tradition and Sacred Scripture the Church receives God’s Revelation and hands it on from one generation to the next. Sacred Scripture is God’s revealed Word, written by human beings under the guidance and inspiration of the Holy Spirit. God ensured that the authors taught divine and saving truth without error. Sacred Scripture will “always be a fountain of faith for those who read it in a spirit of prayer” (USCCA, pp. 31–32).
The teaching office of the Church, the Magisterium, the Pope and the Bishops in communion with him—has the task of authoritatively interpreting the Word of God as contained in Sacred Scripture and transmitted by Sacred Tradition. All the faithful share in the responsibility for understanding and handing on God’s revealed truth and proclaiming and witnessing to God’s reign of love, justice, peace, freedom, mercy, healing, forgiveness, and salvation in our time and place.
Next session we will explore how we respond to God’s Revelation.
Please read this week USCCA,Chapter 3, "Proclaim the Gospel to Every Creature (Mk 16:15)" (pages 21–33), the CCC, Nos. 74–133 (pages 24–37), and the Compendium, Nos. 11–17.
VIDEOS
"What's God's Plan for Me?" (C4–Bishop Don Hying)
"Caught Not Taught Faith" (Prof. Tom Groome and Matt Weber, Boston College)
"How to Live Your Faith Daily" (Prof. Tom Groome and Matt Weber)
"Relationship, Tradition and Scripture"–CCC Nos. 80–100 (Fr. Daniel Mahan)
"Sacred Scripture"–CCC Nos. 101–141 (Fr. Daniel Mahan)
MUSIC
How Beautiful" (Twila Paris)
"Faces of God" (Sister Rebecca Shonas, OP)
OTHER RESOURCES
"From Mass to Mission - The Liturgy of the Word"
Prayer - "Lifting Heart and Mind to God" (Fr. Ronald Rolheiser, OMI)
REFLECT ON YOUR EXPERIENCE
What do you presently do to learn and understand more about God’s revealed truth?
What do you think will help you to better learn and understand more?
How do you transmit your faith to your children, family, friends, co-workers, and strangers you meet?
We encourage and invite you to spend time to reflect, pray, and write in your journal about what you have read, seen, heard, or experienced this week. You can find some other questions you may wish to consider here.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning, in now, and ever shall be.
Amen.
What do you presently do to learn and understand more about God’s revealed truth?
What do you think will help you to better learn and understand more?
How do you transmit your faith to your children, family, friends, co-workers, and strangers you meet?
as it was in the beginning, in now, and ever shall be.
Amen.