What Qualities are Important for Young Catholics to Possess?

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catholic03

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Pax Christi,

One often considers how one can best be a good witness to others, so that they may see Christ in one’s actions, words and deeds.

I love our Holy Mother Church, and have great zeal for the salvation of souls. Nonetheless, I find it hard to approach others my age who are willing to take me seriously as a Catholic. Religion is seen as outdated and as something that only insecure people could wish to take part in.

How do I, as a young Catholic, better radiate the love of Christ? For many people I know, they have never met a priest or a practising Catholic, and so in a way I ‘represent’ the Catholic Church in their eyes, which is a worrying responsibility. How does one properly represent the Truth that is taught by the Church without moralising, or coming across as too serious or stern?

May God Bless You, and please pray for the conversion of poor sinners.
 
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Lead by example, not by preaching and pointing out mistakes all the time.
Live with Joy, so that they will want what they see in you.
Practice your faith openly, but without being so focused on evangelizing that you forget that people are family, or friends or fellow students and have other things going on in their lives too.
 
Besides what @Irishmom2 posted, receive the Sacraments frequently and worthily. Our Lord said: “…without Me you can do nothing.” (Gospel of St. John). St. Paul wrote (Phil. 4: 13): “I can do all things in Him who strengthens me.”

They’re 2 sides of the same coin. We need to be in the state of sanctifying grace in order for our actions to gain merit before God.

And with the Great Fast coming up: prayer, fasting and almsgiving.
 
What is most corrosive to a Christian witness to others, I suggest, is the counter-witness in the same person of what is painfully common: love for this world and the things of this world. The counter-witness has two effects in those people who are observing him:
  1. He is just like us! We can be friends with him. We can like him, and welcome him into our group.
  2. He seems to be religious too; therefore maybe we can be “religious” and not have to give up all the fun things we are free to do now - just as he shows he is doing.
I suggest that this counter-witness removes for us a great cost of fidelity to the Faith: the Cross.
BUT without the Cross, we are not a witness to Him nor are we in truth following Him:
Luk 9:23 And he said to all, "If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.
Luk 9:24 For whoever would save his life will lose it; and whoever loses his life for my sake, he will save it.
Luk 9:25 For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses or forfeits himself?
Luk 9:26 For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, of him will the Son of man be ashamed when he comes in his glory and the glory of the Father and of the holy angels.
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It is absolutely necessary to be certain in one’s own heart: Whom do I love with all my heart and soul and mind and strength? If in truth He - the Lord God - is the center of my life and being, I can proceed with confidence, unconcerned with the fruit of my works. He will bring forth the fruit, if I in truth am in union with Him.
Mt 6:24 "No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon.
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As Father Faber said “love, love, and love !” And he was a true lover of the one holy and catholic church, he LOVED the Church! …he also wrote eloquently on “kindness”…and intercessory prayer…and joy!

God Bless You!!! You sound like a beautiful young person.
 
Be kind and loving to everyone. Don’t moralize.

I knew a Catholic guy in my grad school who tragically died shortly after graduation. Everyone remembered what a kind person he was and how he would always go out of his way to help someone else, even lending his car at one point. One person of color was touched that he helped her because she said in her experience most people didn’t trust her because of her race, so him trusting her to return a loaned item meant a lot.

I don’t remember this guy ever moralizing once over anything in the 3 years we were in school together. I remember him as being funny, kind, smart, able to have a good time, and a hard worker. His funeral was packed.

This is what we should strive for. Not running around making speeches on how sinful other people are. Nobody wants to be around that. As a Catholic myself, I wouldn’t even want to be around that.
 
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In this world, kindness and love are so important. Recognizing the dignity in every person.

Make 1 Corinthians chapter 13 part of your mission statement, your examine of conscience, your meditation. Read it in different translations. Commit it to memory.

You will be a force for Christ in this world.
 
“If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing…Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrong, but rejoices in the right. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never ends…
So faith, hope, love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love”. Revised Standard Version, Catholic Edition.

That is an absolutely beautiful chapter, that provides a new perspective on life. That chapter truly gives the Christian a new perspective.

May God Bless You, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
 
One idea. Know your culture and the worldview of your peers so you can speak skillfully in their own “language”. One idea - Edward Sri has a completely wonderful CD and book on relativism, which by my observations as a 50-something, has been universally embraced by your generation.

BTW I love your heart, your desire to help people see God and his truth. It’s heartwarming.
 
Young people I know do a lot already by going to Mass and fasting when it is obligatory and refusing to join in plans which would stop them doing so.
 
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