CATECHETICAL LESSON 4: MISSION: SENT BY THE FATHER
Introduction
Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”(Jn 20, 21)
At the very moment when by Jesus´ death, He conquers death so that raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, He might immediately give the Holy Spirit by breathing on His disciples. From that hour onward, the mission of Christ and the Holy Spirit becomes the mission of the Church (CCC 730).
Christ founded His Church to continue His saving mission on earth. “The Church, endowed with the gifts of her founder, receives the mission to proclaim and to establish among all peoples the Kingdom of Christ and of God” (LG 5). This ‘mission’ is built into her very nature as originating from the Blessed Trinity. The mission flows from the Church as a “Sacrament of salvation,” the sign and instrument for achieving intimate union with God (cf. AG 5; LG 1; CFC 1412). Thus, the Church has a mission mandate (cf. Mt 28:19): whose origin and goal is the Blessed Trinity (cf. AG 2); motivated by God’s love (cf. 2 Cor 5:14); and with the Holy Spirit as its Principal Agent (cf CCC 849-56). The mission of Christ and of the Holy Spirit is brought to completion in the Church, which is the Body of Christ and the Temple of the Holy Spirit. This joint mission brings Christ’s faithful to share in His communion with the Father and the Holy Spirit. The Lord's missionary mandate is ultimately grounded in the eternal love of the Most Holy Trinity: “the Church on earth is by her nature missionary since, according to the plan of the Father, she has as her origin the mission of the Son and the Holy Spirit” (AG 2). The ultimate purpose of mission is none other than to make men share in the communion between the Father and the Son in their Spirit of love (CCC 850). It is from God's love that the Church in every age receives both the obligation and the vigor of her missionary dynamism, indeed, God desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth ( 1Tim 2:4). That is, God wills the salvation of everyone through the knowledge of the truth. Thus, salvation is founded on the truth (CCC 851).
Photo from Diocese of Kidapawan
LESSON 4: Mission: Sent By The Father -37-
