OKay..lets get busy! Who do we evangelize first?

[erlembald]

Since Pope Francis belongs to the Society of Jesus, I think we should do it Jesuit-style: target pretenders to the thrones of the world’s monarchies and convert them!! npatrol:

But all jokes aside, we should maybe focus especially on policy makers and opinion leaders, since their conversion would have a multiplying effect. I know this sounds rather cynical, but Christ himself said in Matthew 10:16, “Behold I send you as sheep in the midst of wolves. Be ye therefore **wise as serpents **and simple as doves.”

 

[sojo]

Its a no-brainer to me - I am to evangelize whoever the Holy Spirit places in front of me and me in front of them! Ourselves, and our families are within easy reach, and then our co-workers, our neighbors, and anyone else we come in contact with. And like St. Francis, I will try to preach continually and if necessary, use words.

The Pope has ordered his priests to go out into the streets - he obviously wants them to get out there more and mix it up with the people. He feels they spend too much time “preaching to the choir” I suppose. And he should know - even as Archbishop, he would prowl the slums regularly evangelizing, encouraging, taking confessions, etc.

Should we the laity get our own marching orders from Pope Francis, I will obey. But until then, I will evangelize to anyone and everyone that I come across in my normal day to day life. And my online life. I don’t think I need to overthink it. Did Jesus tell us not to evangelize to strangers until we had fully evangelized ourselves? He said to go out and share the Good News.

 

[Armor_of_Light]

What do you mean, Why would anyone want to convert?

Why would anyone want to be on a mountain top and feel the fresh wind in their face?

Why would anyone want to hear the truth?

Why would anyone love our Blessed Mother Mary?

Why would anyone want to receive Christ’s Precious Blood and Body?

Why would anyone want to follow in the foot steps of Christ?

Why would anyone long for the face of God?

Goodness gracious child, what are you talking about?

We are to show forth and God’s love and mercy. And we are to show forth the Beauty of His Bride the Church.

Why indeed!!!

But you are right. We must look into our hearts to understand why God’s Church is so wonderful.

We can not give what we do not have. We must love our Church before we can give this love to another.

All that is absolutely true, I agree.

But, it means very little to people, even most catholics, if it means giving up birth control and telling their daughters they can’t be priests.

‘Our’ truth (even though it is the only truth) gets muddied by the limp wristed way we have to deal with falsities. We can’t call heretics heretics anymore. Our God is the same as the moslem god. Salvation only ‘subsists in’ the catholic church.

It is a tough sell when, pressed for an answer, we no longer give people the hard truth and admit that they have as good a shot at salvation outside the church.

I think the real answer is allowing the Holy Ghost to convert people while we try to let Him work through us. Good answer?

 

[jimcav]

Since Pope Francis belongs to the Society of Jesus, I think we should do it Jesuit-style: target pretenders to the thrones of the world’s monarchies and convert them!! npatrol:

But all jokes aside, we should maybe focus especially on policy makers and opinion leaders, since their conversion would have a multiplying effect. I know this sounds rather cynical, but Christ himself said in Matthew 10:16, “Behold I send you as sheep in the midst of wolves. Be ye therefore **wise as serpents **and simple as doves.”

I agree.

The multiplying effect would be tremendous, so we must also go to Hollywood then, which is another place where conversion would have a multiplying effect. Think what would happen if we could bring a Tom Cruise, a John Travolta, or Charlie Sheen, Lindsy Lohan and Madonna back to the light of their faith! What an effect it would have on literally millions of fallen away Catholics and no-Catholics too. There testimony would truly bear great witness to God’s healing grace!

Sad as it is, Hollywood, TV and the entertainment world has made many forget about faith and God, so they could play an important part in the re-birth of the faith as well.

Why hasn’t the Church reached out to these high profile lapsed Catholics?

 

[crazzeto]

I think the ultimate target is secular culture. This could include cultural Catholics certainly.

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[HelenRose]

All that is absolutely true, I agree.

But, it means very little to people, even most catholics, if it means giving up birth control and telling their daughters they can’t be priests.

‘Our’ truth (even though it is the only truth) gets muddied by the limp wristed way we have to deal with falsities. We can’t call heretics heretics anymore. Our God is the same as the moslem god. Salvation only ‘subsists in’ the catholic church.

It is a tough sell when, pressed for an answer, we no longer give people the hard truth and admit that they have as good a shot at salvation outside the church.

I think the real answer is allowing the Holy Ghost to convert people while we try to let Him work through us. Good answer?

I think we are basically on the same page but I have some other thoughts as well.

We must not only know what these difficult teachings are but why they are so important for happiness here and now. God did not set these teachings up solely so we would break the law and then not obtain salvation. God’s teachings are for us. They are good and pure and lead us to Him.

We need to imitate Blessed Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict and our wonderful Pope Francis. How is it done? Each one of these Popes have been patient, full of love, kind, and absolutely sure of the Gospel and the rightness of these teachings. I can only speak for myself, but I became a Catholic because the Church taught me that Christ understood my unbelief. He understands how very difficult these teachings are. It has taken me a long time to understand their meaning. On my journey I know that God was leading me.

I can not be the least bit effective in my efforts to evangelize my loved ones if I am worried to death that they are going to hell. I put all my trust in God and ask Him to lead them while in my efforts I do want I can. For the young men and women in my family whose life styles are so chaotic, I reach out to them in love. Fortunately I have the beautiful titles of “Auntie” and “Grandma” . They do not really understand why I am a Catholic but I am honest with them. They respect me and I know full well in time they will understand.

It is hard for many Catholics to understand the teaching of the mercy of God to non-catholics and the possibility of their salvation. These teachings can be as difficult to understand as the teachings that young people have so much trouble with.

 

[Lucky7]

Honestly, the way I’m feeling lately, it needs to come from the Pope. He needs to make it absolutely **crystal clear **that the Catholic Church is the fullness of the Faith…in his words and in his actions.

 

[HelenRose]

Getting back to the original question. Who do we evangelize first?

Every moment of every day we must evangelize ourselves first with prayer, study and love.

We must know and love our faith to the inner most part of our souls.

Pope Francis is teaching you and me. He is evangelizing us.

Then we must show in our words and actions the beauty of our faith.

Have done our part, The Holy Spirit will lead us to those whom we can touch.

Christ’s love must shine through us. It is the only way. Debating is a tool, speaking is a tool but only Christ’s love can use those tools effectively.

 

[Arrependida]

Honestly, the way I’m feeling lately, it needs to come from the Pope. He needs to make it absolutely **crystal clear **that the Catholic Church is the fullness of the Faith…in his words and in his actions.

The same with me.
Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio seems to have been very much involved in ecumenism in Argentina in a way that confuses me. Ecumenism with very liberal Jewish leaders and ecumenism even with afro-brazilian Umbanda priests.
If all religions are ok, and lead to the one true God, even the ones that do bloody sacrifices to demonic entities, why should I try to convert my protestant friends to the Catholic Church?
I feel discouraged and I will give it a pause to that for now…I hope Pope Francis will show us he believes it is important to convert people into the Catholic Church.

renewamerica.com/images/columns/13/130316marielena6.jpg

romancatholicworld.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/press-release-from-jewish-press-in-argentina-rabbi-abraham-skorka-in-favor-of-homosexual-union.pdf

youtube.com/watch?v=BkeaWNH2kCE&feature=em-share_video_user

 

[Aussieman88]

The Pope could get the church to come up with a course to teach us laity the best ways to do it. with teams to go out on the streets and teams to keep teaching the people who want to come and hear or learn more.

We should get more serious with promoting and teaching the Catholic Charismatic Renewal firstly to our own catholic people who think any evidence of someone being filled with the Holy Spirit is weird. I’m talking about speaking in tongues and any other spiritual gift. I think most catholics don’t really believe that stuff. Jesus said it over and over again by his own mouth. The one who believes in me will do the things I have done and greater. These signs will follow the one who believes in me. Mk .16;16.

I don’t believe us Catholics can evangelise to our best without embracing signs and wonders. Having said this I do agree with what everyone on here has already said. We need to work on ourselves and get ourselves to a place where God can use us in this way. If we are in the right place and we preach the good news, then signs and wonders will just follow us around to confirm the Word of God. Thats what the bible says.

 

[crazzeto]

The Pope could get the church to come up with a course to teach us laity the best ways to do it. with teams to go out on the streets and teams to keep teaching the people who want to come and hear or learn more.

We should get more serious with promoting and teaching the Catholic Charismatic Renewal firstly to our own catholic people who think any evidence of someone being filled with the Holy Spirit is weird. I’m talking about speaking in tongues and any other spiritual gift. I think most catholics don’t really believe that stuff. Jesus said it over and over again by his own mouth. The one who believes in me will do the things I have done and greater. These signs will follow the one who believes in me. Mk .16;16.

I don’t believe us Catholics can evangelise to our best without embracing signs and wonders. Having said this I do agree with what everyone on here has already said. We need to work on ourselves and get ourselves to a place where God can use us in this way. If we are in the right place and we preach the good news, then signs and wonders will just follow us around to confirm the Word of God. Thats what the bible says.

You know, I like this idea… Of street teachers. Of course volunteers would have to go in knowing you will face all manner of abuse, and be ok with that. But honestly, I would do it.

 

[George_Theodoro]

It’s both. Don’t think in terms of either, or. But there is a difference.

We witness Christ’s love so people may individually be saved by Christ’s love. But, we need a “Big Picture” impact on the whole culture to change the culture. For example, who says the media has to be liberal? Who made that rule? Who says abortion or gay marriage is acceptable? Where did that idea come from? Since ideas and therefore cultures aren’t material concrete things, they can be morphed. The bad guys are good at doing this.

I suggest that a failure to evangelize isn’t usually a failure of faith or theology. It’s a failure of tactics and strategy. Long have I looked for a group that would combine individual and cultural evangelization. A non-political evangelical group that would be to the Catholic Church what the (now don’t freak out, think about this) Communist Party was to Marxist Socialism: its hands, heart, lungs, and guts. No such group exists. I’ve looked. To get a glimpse of how such a group would behave, click on the link below.

In September 1962, author Douglas Hyde was the main speaker at a five day seminar held by the American branch of the Mission’s Secretariat of the Catholic Church. His topic? His book, Dedication and Leadership. This is life changing stuff. This is culture changing stuff. If you think America needs changing go to garynorth.com/Hyde.pdf

 

[Adamski]

I evangelize everyone all the time moving them closer to the fullness of the truth

This week
1- I talked to an atheist about morals
2-a lapsed presbytian and a lapsed Methodist about returning to Christianity
3- a practicing baptist about the shroud of Turin
4-a practing catholic about how we can get is father in law to go to mass more regularly

 

[PJM]

=Armor of Light;10501848]I’m thinking we should evangelize catholics first, to boost our numbers before evangelizing anyone else.

Also…Since there is such confusion (for some) regarding:

‘no salvation outside the church’
inability to call non-catholics ‘heretics’
‘subsists in’
true ecumenism
fraternal correction
the ‘militant’ of Church Militant
etc…

Seriously. Why would anyone want to convert? Its a tough sell if the Church is not necessary for salvation. The argument from authority, i/e Jesus told us to, only goes so far.

Discuss and please don’t read stuff into this OP. I stated things as clearly as possible with no ulterior motives.

I agree with CATHOLICS first:thumbsup:

Just HOW are you going to do this?

As for your other points:

be pragmatic

God is One

One God can morally, Theologically and Logically have ONLY One set of Faith beliefs

Christ founded only One Church and Faith [see Eph. 4: 4-8] for example

God Bless,
pat/PJM

 

[Iheartcoffee]

I am considering designing some business cards that politely invite people to check out Catholic.com. I am also going to include the fact that we have message boards. Even if people come onto the site with ulterior motives to just start arguments rather than truly debate, I feel it will plant a seed and at least they will know that this site exists. I think this is such a wonderfully comprehensive website and if we could get more people to come learn the truth about what we believe, (rather than all the stereotypes) this website could be a great tool for evangelizing.

 

[just_came_back]

We evangelize ourselves, as individuals, first.

Others are converted by witnessing one’s own ongoing conversion. Conversion is a life-long process that requires constant attention until we die.

If we think that someone elses conversion is a higher priority than our own, then we are more concerned with the speck in our neighbour’s eye than the log in our own, and the battle is lost: we will likely only turn off the person we are trying to convert. That isn’t evangelizing, it’s proselytizing.

And that applies equally to fellow Catholics whom we perceive to have a flawed view of what we perceive as “truth”.

I am glad I saw THIS. I have a lapsed Catholic friend who refuses to return to the Church and when my own life is not right, I can see where my slackness may have impacted him as well.

 

[PJM]

=Iheartcoffee;10526255]I am considering designing some business cards that politely invite people to check out Catholic.com. I am also going to include the fact that we have message boards. Even if people come onto the site with ulterior motives to just start arguments rather than truly debate, I feel it will plant a seed and at least they will know that this site exists. I think this is such a wonderfully comprehensive website and if we could get more people to come learn the truth about what we believe, (rather than all the stereotypes) this website could be a great tool for evangelizing.

GREAT ideas!

 

[crazzeto]

I am considering designing some business cards that politely invite people to check out Catholic.com. I am also going to include the fact that we have message boards. Even if people come onto the site with ulterior motives to just start arguments rather than truly debate, I feel it will plant a seed and at least they will know that this site exists. I think this is such a wonderfully comprehensive website and if we could get more people to come learn the truth about what we believe, (rather than all the stereotypes) this website could be a great tool for evangelizing.

That’s fantastic!