Serving in faith

Guided by the Spirit - Scarboro Laity in Mission

Guest Editorial
By Jean MacInnis
October 2004

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Share the goodness that lies within your heart, and you shall find happiness. This was our experience this past summer. Many of Scarboro's priest and lay missioners were home, as well as some past missioners, sharing their personal stories and experiences of mission. We are blessed. Those blessings continue to flow and multiply, as you will read in "Where are they now?" featuring some of our former missioners. Their lives continue to be motivated by their cross-cultural experience as Scarboro lay missioners.

Our very sincere thanks to Kathy VanLoon as she gathers, edits and creatively captures the essence of these stories, experiences and pictures to produce this issue of Scarboro Missions magazine.

We share with you some of the joys and challenges, heartaches too, flowing from our life-changing experiences as missioners walking in other lands and cultures. Each story reveals a unique experience of God. Each person has special gifts that they take with them in their mission journey-whether it is as a quiet presence or in active service. At times, we do not think about the impact these gifts have on the "other"-the peoples to whom we are sent. I am convinced that it is the Spirit who guides us in our journey and puts us where we are supposed to be at any given time... Serving in faith, guided by the Spirit.

The Scarboro lay mission program has been growing steadily over the past number of years. In total we are 27, with 22 serving overseas and five assisting in mission administration here at Scarboro's central house in Toronto. As Dean Riley, a past missioner and summer visitor to Scarboro noted: "We are scattered around the globe and some have never even met, yet we are inextricably bound together by faith and commitment—sharing a common vision."

Regretfully, we will not be offering the formation program in 2005 as there are insufficient candidates to present a successful program. However, three people have been formally accepted and have generously agreed to enter the 2006 program. They come in a spirit well described by another summer visitor and former lay missioner Lorraine Reaume: "I have learned to trust our marvelous God who lures us to new life in mysterious ways."

So we continue this wonderful journey in faith and trust, thanking God for our Scarboro community, for our families, and for you, our friends and benefactors, who make this journey possible.

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