Get Involved In The Faith

5 Feb

“Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.”  ~ Benjamin Franklin

Last week, our school celebrated Catholic Schools Week.  It gave the school, and our parish, a chance to celebrate the history and benefits of Catholic education.  Throughout the years, St. Thomas More Church has done its best to provide an opportunity for our students to learn and grow in a faith-based environment.  The students are invited to consider their responsibility to one another and to others through all sorts of charitable works.

School parents are challenged to connect with the school environment by volunteering service hours in various capacities.  Many parents will recount that they felt less connected to the school and its mission to educate until they became involved as volunteers.

In our parish, in any parish for that matter, members in the RCIA program (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults) are encouraged, post-Easter, to involve themselves in the ministries of the Church.

Why are our students, their parents, and those who prepare to convert to Catholicism invited and encouraged to join in ministries of service?  Franklin reminds us, “Tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember, involve me and I learn.”

We invite and encourage our students, parents, converts, and all of our parishioners to get involved because hearing about the needs of others is one thing but doing something about it for others is quite another.  When we become involved in the faith, our faith makes more sense to us.  It becomes more personal.  Getting involved makes it likely that we will remain faithful members of the Church.

Jesus didn’t invite His disciples to think about things. He invited His disciples to do things, to go out to the world and tell the Good News, to heal the sick, and announce favor from God.  When His disciples went out, they came back telling about wondrous things that happened to others and to themselves because the did the work that Jesus commissioned them to do.

We have been commissioned by the Lord as well by the virtue of our own baptisms.  It’s nice to hear about it.  It’s more wonderful to live our faith, becoming fully involved in the promise of God.

FAITH ACTION:  Learn the faith by living the faith and do your best to invite others to do the same that they, too, may come closer to Christ.