NOW THAT WE HAVE FAITH, WHAT DO WE DO?
StillCatholic.com
1. You’re Catholic but you haven’t been to church lately:
Call your parish rectory
right now, jot down days and times for confession, Sunday mass, daily mass, and
Eucharistic adoration. You can retrieve phone numbers for all U.S. churches at
masstimes.org.
Decide right now what you’ll
to give up next Lent: Pick something that hurts. Say an “Our Father” right now.
Get a pen and make out a check to church or a charity (research the charity to
ensure only a small percentage of funds goes to administrative costs, and that
90 to 98 percent goes to the poor, the hungry, sick children, storm victims,
AIDS or cancer research, etc.). Ask your priest and friends to suggest reputable
charities. Get to bookstore this weekend for a catechism and Bible. Make a
resolution never to go through one more day without prayer.
Get to confession as soon as
possible. If you can’t get to confession before Sunday, still go to Mass, but
don’t receive Communion. Pick up a parish bulletin and check for volunteer
opportunities. Check out other service projects, like Habitat for Humanity,
homeless dinners and programs for tutoring children from the inner city. Make a
list of nice things you can do for friends and relatives over the next few
months (help someone move, bake cookies for a widow, mow lawn or shovel snow
for elderly, give blood, offer to babysit for a couple that hasn’t been out
lately, offer someone a ride, write a letter to a politician, e-mail a TV show
and kindly ask them to cut out the crudity or sexual content, do some research
on candidates in upcoming elections to discern if they agree with your values).
Also, Download rosary instructions from http://www.newadvent.org/faq/rosary.pdf. Buy a
rosary while at Catholic bookstore, or online. Say one rosary per week for
peace. Pray, pray, pray.
2. You’re Catholic but your marriage is not valid in the Catholic Church.
Make an appointment with
your parish priest immediately. Things may be simpler than you think. Pray.
Attend Mass but do not receive Communion. Go back to #1.
3. YOU want to become Catholic:
Start attending Mass but do
not participate in Communion yet.
Your parish should have a
regularly running program for people wishing to join the Catholic Church. It
welcomes non-Christians as well as Christians of other denominations who wish
to bring the blessings and truths they have received through their own
churches, and to share in the fullness of the universal Church.
Simply, call your local
parish church and sign up for the next RCIA (Rite of Christian Initiation for
Adults) program. Start reading the catechism, and rereading the Bible. Pray. If
you’re in a second marriage, call your parish for an annulment application so
you can discern whether or not your first marriage was valid.
The most basic thing
Christians are called to do is to join the Church established by Jesus. God
will do the rest.
4. YOU already go to Mass on Sundays
and Holy Days of Obligation, and you pray regularly but you want to grow closer
to God, and to make a bigger difference in the world:
If you
haven’t been to Confession in a while, do that first. It won’t kill you. Your
eternal life is worth it. If you can’t attend Mass daily, try one weekday Mass
per week. There is bound to be a church within a couple miles of your work or
home with a convenient time. In fact, within three miles of mine, Catholic
churches offer Masses at 6:30 a.m., 7 a.m., 8 a.m., 8:30 a.m., noon, and 5:30
p.m. Another option is Saturday morning
masses. Pay extra attention to Christ when you receive him in the Eucharist.
Stay an extra 15 minutes after mass to meditate on the Stations of the Cross.
If you haven’t said the rosary in a while, download instructions at http://www.newadvent.org/faq/rosary.pdf and try
one tonight. Or say a 54-day rosary novena for a friend in need. Novena info at
http://www.immaculateheart.com/Ave%20Maria/novena_54_day.htm.
Say an act of contrition daily.
Many devout Christians fast on bread and water two days per week. Those who cannot do this may commit to one day or one evening per week. Give something small up each week: car radio? favorite TV show? cup of cappuccino? God says to fast, pray and do charity in secret if you want to make a difference. He tells us to suffer with Him and to take up our cross. Thanks to God’s grace, every tiny bit we do for him is made valuable, and helps improve the world. Just as carbon dioxide is converted to oxygen, God will convert every good work and prayer of yours to goodness and healing for the people of the world.
While you figure out what your long-term mission is, try to get involved in a short-term one this month: A Saturday at Habitat for Humanity? Volunteer at a homeless dinner? Start a weekly prayer group at your house? Short-term mission to Appalachia or Third-world country to help build schools? Teach a CCD class? Read at Mass? Help organize a door-to-door campaign to invite Catholics back to Church? Volunteer to sell the Catholic Standard & Times in the back of church one or more Sundays (215-587-3667 for info). Help organize a Catholic youth group or young-adult group? Invite your friends to attend church and confession with you.
4. YOU already go to daily Mass,
monthly confession, weekly Scripture study, say a daily rosary, nightly
examination of conscience and fast on bread and water two days a week in
secret. You give up your favorite group of foods for Lent, also in secret. You
spent last year in a poor rural area of Bolivia teaching advanced agricultural
methods, and the previous year in Mexico helping build better irrigation and
water purification systems. You volunteer once a week at the home for young pregnant
mothers and once a week at the AIDS hospice. You’re an avid reader of St.
Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, all the saints, all the church councils and
Church history, and can explain your faith to anyone. You just took in another
foster child, and your wheelchair-bound grandmother. You make dinners for the
shut-ins. You give enough of your salary to the poor that it really, really
hurts. You refrain from buying fancy new clothes, jewelry and furniture.
Hmmm…..Pray for the rest of
us.
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Footnote on
deeds.
As
Catholics, we know that our works are only valuable to God and to the Body of Christ
around the world if we are already in a grace-filled relationship with God,
that is, if we are right with God, that is, we already have faith.
It is a
mistake to think one can commit a mortal sin and make up for it by doing
charity work the same day. Membership in God’s family requires a full and pure
commitment to following God’s will.
We do not
believe it is possible to “earn” our salvation. We inherited salvation simply
by being baptized into God’s family. (John 3:5, Tit 3:5, Acts 2:37-38, Acts 22:16,
Rom 6:4, 1 Pet 3:21)
Salvation
is ours unless we trash it, or cut ourselves out of the family by sinning
mortally. (1 John 5:16-17, James 1:14-15, Rom 11:22, 1 Cor 9:27, , Gal 5:4, 1
Cor 10:11-12, Mt 24:13, 2 Tim 2:11-13, )
If we are not in a right relationship with God, then no matter what works we do, they will be worthless, filthy rags, according to the Bible. They would be just as worthless as the guy who, while planning to run a scam on the elderly next week, volunteers at the Special Olympics this week to make up for it. There is no such thing as earning salvation. Balancing out our good works with evil works will not help us.
Finally,
even a person that does mighty deeds will not see heaven if he or she does
those things without the love and commitment of Jesus.
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