11. Spread the Gospel far and wide.

YOUCAT Catechism + Catechism of the Catholic Church Lesson 11

AVE MARIA SERIES

11.  Why do we hand on the faith?

We hand on the faith because Jesus commands us:  “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations”  (Matthew 28:19).  [91]

Stephanie May, my grandniece!  …..11

No genuine Christian leaves the transmission of the faith exclusively to specialists (teachers, pastors, missionaries).  We are Christ for others.  This means that every genuine Christian would like God to come to other people, too.  He says to himself, “The Lord needs me!  I have been baptized and confirmed and am responsible for helping the people around me to learn about God and ‘to come to the knowledge of the truth’ (1 Timothy 2:4b).”   Mother Teresa used a good comparison:  “Often you can see power lines running alongside the street.  Unless current is flowing through them, there is no light.  The power line is you and I!  The current is God!  We have the power to allow the current to flow through us and thus to generate the light of the world:  JESUS—or to refuse to be used and, this, allow the darkness to spread.”  123

“Apart from Jesus Christ we do not know what God, life, death, and we ourselves are.”  Blaise Pascal

“I have no imagination.  I cannot picture God the Father.  All that I can see is Jesus.”  Blessed Teresa of Calcutta (1910-1997, foundress of the Missionaries of Charity, Nobel Peace Prize winner)

“The happiness you are seeking, the happiness you have a right to enjoy, has a name and a face: it is Jesus of Nazareth.”  Pope Benedict XVI, August 18, 2005

 “There is an urgent need for the emergence of a new generation of apostles anchored firmly in the word of Christ, capable of responding to the challenges of our times and prepared to spread the Gospel far and wide.”  Pope Benedict XVI, February 22, 2006

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The supernatural sense of faith

91 All the faithful share in understanding and handing on revealed truth. They have received the anointing of the Holy Spirit, who instructs them (1 John 2:20, 27) and guides them into all truth (John 16:13). --Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition