Go
into the whole world and proclaim the gospel to every creature.
So says the Lord
Jesus to his disciples, right before he is taken up before their eyes. This
instruction is so big, so huge, so infinite that nothing and nobody is excluded. Go into
the whole world and proclaim the gospel to every creature: every place,
every time.
This is the constant
for us priests. The whole priest “thing”
launched with that word: go. So, we go.
We go far more than we stay. We
go everywhere, we go whenever; and we go when and where we are told to go, not
when or where we choose to go.
Fr. McCabe, whose
missionary experiences are now well known to you, has taken this charge to its
most complete meaning. For Fr. McDonell,
it may seem to be less the case. But why
has he been here? Because his bishop
said, go. And now why is he leaving us? Because his bishop said, go.
Now, it may seem to
you that after nine years, I have lost familiarity with the sound of that word,
go. But it was that word that brought me
here in the first place – then took me away, across the Atlantic and back, then
back here again. So, my staying here,
even this long, is because I was told to go.
That’s the first
part. The second part, about proclaiming
the Gospel, is astonishingly universal: to
every creature? Really? Jesus Christ is the incarnate Son of God,
crucified, died, raised, and ascended: that is the Good News. There is no creature who has some other
message coming, nor anyone for whom some other news is the good. And
there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven
given among men by which we must be saved. (Acts 4:12)
What response does this
news call for? Repentance, for the
forgiveness of sins, as Jesus himself never tired of explaining. It is such a magnificent offer that no one
should be left out, but Jesus knows that some will opt out. Whoever
believes and is baptized will be saved; whoever does not believe will be
condemned.
Every creature on
earth, in every place and at every time, needs that good news and the
opportunity to make that response. To
make that happen requires a lot of go-ing.
For those who are sent, it makes the
importance of going all the more clear.
That we understand the only two possible outcomes is one of the main
reasons we are willing and ready to go.
So this week you see it:
the Church in motion. The Apostles heard
the word, and they went. Ever since,
souls called to preach have heard the word, and gone. It seems random, unpredictable, unsettling,
and upsetting, but this is the life of the Church, who, as our Holy Father has
reminded us, does not have a mission, but is a mission. It is a big world, and there are many, many
souls in need of hearing the Good News.
Some of them are here, some in Detroit, some in a location to be named
(by Maryknoll) later.
I don’t know about
you, but I am sad that they are going. I
enjoyed their company and their help and their friendship and support. But even when they came, I knew it was so
that one day they could go. And their
willingness to go makes me glad.
So thank Frs. McCabe
and McDonell for everything they did for you, including their continued
willingness to go. Wish them
well, and promise your prayers. But
don’t take too long about it; if they are going to Go into the whole world and proclaim the gospel to every creature,
they had better get going. Godspeed!
Monsignor Smith
