The Harvest is Plentiful, The Laborers Are Few…

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Frodo: I wish the Ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had happened.
Gandalf: So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us. There are other forces at work in this world, Frodo, besides the will of evil.” 

      – The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien, Catholic author

Deciding to take the initial steps to evangelize someone takes courage. We must trust in our Father to do the work and to supply us with the grace to accomplish His will. We must, however, heed His call and cooperate with His plan to save us and save those whom we are evangelizing. Remember that you are offering someone a gift, the pearl of great price, and it would be wrong to withhold the Good News from them. For many years, the average Catholic in the pew has seen the task of evangelization as lying in the hands of the clergy. Approximately 98.5 % of the Catholics in the world are laypersons. Leaving it up to the other 1.5 % to proclaim the Gospel and lead people to Christ just doesn’t make sense.  Besides, we live in a different world even than that we knew just two decades ago. The forces of secularism, scientism, and modernism have turned our world on its head. In the mid-1960’s, the rate of Sunday Mass attendance was 75 %. According to a recent Pew study, only 30% of Americans who were raised Catholic are still “practicing” – meaning they attend Mass at least once a month. Roughly half are at Mass on a given weekend .The picture is even worse for the young.  More than 50% of adult Catholics are now Gen X (ages 26-46) or Millennials, (ages 18-25,) attending at a rate of 13 % and 10 %, respectively. (…”The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; pray therefore the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” Luke 10:2).

We have to stop thinking that it is somebody else’s job to evangelize and start making it our own. Remember that we are simply planting the seed; it is up to the Holy Spirit to accomplish conversion, or reversion back to the Catholic faith. Some Catholics seem to cherish a false humility - the notion that “I’m insignificant and don’t presume that God is calling me.” That is false humility, a lie. It is almost a rejection of the gift of salvation and the work of the Holy Spirit in your life bestowed upon you in Baptism, Confirmation, and the Eucharist.

We have the right, duty, and power to tell people about Jesus Christ and his Church.

 

You (you, the one reading these words now) are the one being called to evangelize now precisely in this place that God has planted you.

“ Perhaps you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” Esther 4:14.

As Gandalf explains to the reluctant hero Frodo, the forces of evil are great in the world, but so is the force of good. God has placed us here and now. “All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.”

∞

Prayer For Courage

Lord, please give me courage to love you. Give me courage to serve you. Give me courage to tell others about you. Give me courage to grow closer to you. Give me courage to pick up my cross each day as you picked up yours. Remove from me all fear so that you can put me to work for your kingdom. Amen.

— Greg Willets, The New Evangelization and You

What Does the Bible Say?

“ For God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather of power and love and self control.” 2 Tim 1:7

Evangelism Challenge This Week

Visit Catholic Answers Online and Listen on EWTN Radio.

Catholic Answers is the largest Catholic apologetics and evangelization organization in North America. They are lay people devoting a full-time effort to promoting the Catholic faith. The website is easy to remember — Catholic.com

Be A Disciple.