MISSION…Participating in God’s dream for creation

By Fr. Jack Lynch, S.F.M.
September/October 2013

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In the two thousand year history of our church, religious communities have come and gone. Many were founded to evangelize in a particular historical context. Many of them made great contributions to the church and many of these same communities passed out of existence not because they did not fulfill an important role in their day and age, but because new challenges emerged in different his-torical situations. New communities were born that responded to the new realities and challenges to evangelize—to make known the reality of the Incarnation and the teaching of Jesus.

Fr. Jack Lynch during a visit to Scarboro’s mission in Thailand.

Such was the emergence in 1918 of the China Mission College known today as Scarboro Missions. We were founded by Father John Mary Fraser of Toronto who went to China in 1902, profoundly aware that there were great possibilities there to evangelize, and returned to North America to found a seminary to send missionary priests to China.

There have been many changes over the 95 years of our history. A Scarboro colleague did us all a service when he wrote a paper entitled, “The Mission Today”, inviting us to reflect on some of the important developments in the 95 years and to look forward. The following list of changes includes some of his observations as well as my own:

• The painful realization that the missionary enterprise has been closely associated with Western colonialism and that missionaries were often insensitive to the cultures and religions of other peoples.
• Vatican II in its Decree on Missionary Activity assumed that the local church was responsible for evangelizing non-Christians. Prior to that, missionary institutes like Scarboro were responsible for the evangelization of non-Christians in other lands.
• After China was closed to missionaries in 1949, mission was to the South. Today, however, the South is home to more than half of the world’s Christians and more than half of the world’s Roman Catholics.
• Immigration has had a profound effect on our Canadian reality. Within a five kilometre radius of our central-house in Scarborough is a Buddhist temple, a couple of mosques, as well as Hindu temples. Diversity of faith communities and pluralism are our new reality.
• In 1957, 53 percent of Canadians were attending religious services every week. By the year 2000 this had dropped to 21 percent. The Church has lost credibility due to the sexual scandals, abuse of authority and many additional factors.

A New Evangelization

In the early 1980s, Pope John Paul II began to speak earnestly about the need for a new evangelization. In 1983 in Haiti he urged the Church to a new evangelization with a new fervour in both its methods and its expression. Just as our founder and others responded faithfully to the movement of the Spirit of God in their historical and ecclesial context, so too it must be for us as we go forward. Our vocation is to be open to the Spirit of God who is the source and author of mission. Like a midwife, we must be about birthing life. We trust in God present in history and we trust in the words of Jesus who said, “I have come that they may have life and have it in abundance.” We are called to give life while at the same time questioning practices, traditions and customs that are neither inclusive nor life giving. We need to evangelize in a new reality always faithful to Jesus and his teaching.

When we were founded, geographical boundaries were of great importance. Serving God’s mission today involves crossing boundaries, borders, and barriers, most of which are not geographical but rather represent divisions among people. For us, the Reign of God is our focal point. I particularly like the descriptive phrase “companionship of empowerment” to describe the Reign of God or God’s dream for creation. Missionary theologian Fr. Michael McCabe SMA expresses it best: “Christ’s vision of a world transformed by the Reign of God remains the most noble and exciting vision the world has ever known.”

While in Brazil for World Youth Day this past summer, Pope Francis reflected on missionary discipleship and observed that neither the missionary nor the church is the centre: “The centre is Jesus Christ who calls us and sends us forth.” He said that when the church makes herself the centre she makes herself merely functional. He went on to say that “we need a church capable of rediscovering the maternal womb of mercy. Without mercy we have little chance nowadays of becoming part of a world of ‘wounded’ persons in need of understanding, forgive-ness and love.”

I am greatly encouraged by Pope Francis. His pastoral approach and vision of a renewed church that is compassionate, merciful and transparent makes me feel both gratitude and a profound challenge. My personal hope is that we can move forward and be the church that we are called to be. In spite of my years, I feel energized.

Toward the future

This year, I celebrate 45 years of priesthood which in itself is sufficient material for reflection. As Scarboro Missions looks to the future, we find ourselves like the majority of religious communities in North America and Europe experiencing aging and a decline in our membership. In the last few decades, there have been very few candidates for priesthood.

Yet, I feel called to be both realistic and hopeful. I trust in the Spirit of God present in history. In prayer I constantly try to discern how I, we, can best participate in God’s mission, a project that comes from God and belongs to God. I am challenged to integrity and give witness to my belief in Jesus and his teaching.

Recently I read a short reflection, with which I heartily agree, by Fr. William Marrevee on the occasion of his 50th anniversary of ordination. He recalled that the most important thing in his ministry is not the number of years of priestly service but rather how well he has heard the Word of God and kept it. He said, “I treasure the priesthood today even more so than 50 years ago. But in all honesty, there is a nagging question that has surfaced for me over the years: how faithful a disciple of Christ am I in the exercise of my priestly ministry?”

That question is the key to our ministry. We became disciples at baptism and later were ordained to serve in ministry. We have to keep before us constantly the words of Jesus: “Blessed are they who hear the word of God and keep it.”

The values by which Jesus lived and died are not based on the world and its values but rather on what Jesus calls the Kingdom or the Reign of God. The Kingdom of God is the in-breaking of God into the world in unsuspected places and among undeserving people. The Kingdom of God is the new world that God is creating today, even now. A priest friend expressed it this way: Jesus is a role model for society but not society as we know it. Jesus is a role model for society as God dreams society to be. The life of Jesus is a radical reversal of the values of our world. Those values are best articulated in the Beatitudes but are heard as well in all of Jesus’ teaching.

For us, the Spirit of God continues to invite us to be witnesses and collaborators in God’s mission for creation. We need disciples and ministers who are creative and daring in their service to God’s Reign. I encourage others to pick up the challenge to be generous servants of God’s word. Guided by the Holy Spirit, we must celebrate Jesus and make known his teaching in changing times and in new realities. As Scarboro missioner Fr. Buddy Smith once said, “It is a vocation worthy of a lifetime.”

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