\u00a0Mass and Mission\u00a0Father Richard Veras\u00a0
In Sacramentum Caritatis, Pope Benedict XVI explains the integral relationship between Mass and mission through the phrase Ite missa est. This dismissal which concludes Mass has a deeper implication which has to do with the mission of the Christian. Having encountered Christ in word and sacrament, we are sent to carry his presence and witness his presence to the world.\u00a0
This echoes Jesus’ sending forth of the Apostles to nearby towns and villages only after they had spent time in relationship with him. It is even more analogous to Jesus’ instruction to the Apostles to wait in Jerusalem until they would be baptised by the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. Without Christ with them through the Spirit, no words or actions of the Apostles could ever be a true Christian witness. Christianity is not a message of mere words, it is the proclamation of the Word Made Flesh who dwells among us. I cannot witness to his living presence unless I live in him and he lives in me. Encounter precedes mission; in fact, it is the Alpha and Omega of mission.\u00a0
Without the sacramental encounter with Christ, our mission has no content. And Ite, missa est implies that without mission. Mass is somehow incomplete. The Sacraments are not static. They bear within them the presence of Christ, and therefore also bear his longing to go out to all the nations and to save the world.\u00a0
Father Richard Veras is director of pastoral formation at Saint Joseph’s Seminary in New York. He is author of three books, his latest being The Word Made Flesh: Foreshadowed, Fulfilled, Forever
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\u00a0Mass and Mission\u00a0Father Richard Veras\u00a0In Sacramentum Caritatis, Pope Benedict XVI explains the integral relationship between Mass and mission through the phrase Ite missa est. This dismissal which concludes Mass has a deeper implication which has to do with the mission … Continue reading