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Eunice Hii, Youth Speak News

Striving to seek God ‘in all things’ on Impact mission

By  Eunice Hii, Youth Speak News
  • May 29, 2012

A year ago, Archbishop Anthony Mancini of Halifax wrote a letter to the people of his diocese about the New Evangelization. He challenged Catholics, saying, “Become true and active disciples of Christ, committed to the mission of proclaiming the Gospel, again, as if for the first time.”

The “New Evangelization” is a call from Blessed John Paul II for every believer to come to a deeper understanding of their personal faith. This summer, I’m doing this as part of Catholic Christian Outreach’s (CCO) summer mission, Impact, in Halifax. Impact is a 15-week mission trip for university students. We are working in 11 parishes across the archdiocese of Halifax. And it is no coincidence that the theme of Impact 2012, “Behold, I make all things new” from Revelations 21:5, can be found directly in Mancini’s letter.

I arrived in Halifax at the beginning of May, wide-eyed and somewhat naive. In a recent job interview, I shared with the employer that I am in Halifax volunteering for CCO.

The employer then asked me how I felt about the recent cases of sexual abuse by priests in Nova Scotia. I was caught off guard as I certainly had not anticipated such questions. I didn’t quite know the state of the Church we are walking into this summer.

“Our Catholic Church is now in the midst of a worldwide crisis. She faces the hard task of... deepening her self understanding... to become more authentically the community of faith our Lord called His Church to be,” wrote Mancini.

Mancini outlines that we can bring about the New Evangelization in several ways. Foremost, he calls for the need to begin with a renewal of our own personal faiths.

“For too many, being a Catholic has been more about customs, local traditions and family practices than about the personal encounter with Jesus Christ and the decision to turn one’s life over to Him.”

The biggest challenge Mancini poses stems from Revelations 21:5.

“This is the challenge... To seek and find God in all people, in all circumstances, and in all things. This is a foundational and necessary step in the New Evangelization.”

I’ve been asking myself what the role of the Impact team is here in Halifax, a place where some have lost trust in the Church. Perhaps the answer lies in embracing the challenge set forth by Mancini. For the 57 university students on the Impact mission, we’ll strive to seek God “in all people, in all circumstances and in all things.”

Although I have felt deeply moved by Mancini’s letter and have found many ties to the Impact mission in his writing, Mancini’s letter is not just a call to missionaries and priests in Halifax. It is a call to all Catholics around the world.

“The Church cannot be a collection of individual believers, practising their faith in private… Today I am encouraging each one of us and all of us together to take up the task which has been entrusted to us. If we don’t do it, who will?”

(Hii, 21, is a human resources and international relations student at the University of British Columbia.)

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