Before getting deeper into the how of the ‘Formation of missionaries today’ there are important questions to reflect on. Who sends a missionary and what is the message he is being sent to carry out? These two ideas deepen the urgency and the significance of formation required. In short it is God who calls and sends missionaries through the Church authorities.
To carry out the message of salvation to the people, to whom God himself would like to go, a missionary is a ‘mouth of God’. So the sender of a missionary is Christ and the message he has to carry should come from Christ. “After these things the Lord appointed others seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face into every city and place, whither he himself would come” (Luke 10:1). Jesus expected that when he sent those seventy disciples, they will convert people’s hearts, and minds, to perceive what God wanted, making them sons and daughters of the kingdom of God. It is from this ground a missionary should enter into the discernment to discover the message that God wants to deliver to his people. A missionary is not sent to proclaim his own ideas, not his own imaginations, not his own attitudes, he is not sent to practice his own interests, but the interests of God. This is possible through obedience to God and to the Church authority. A self-reflection is needed by a missionary in order to discover the hindrance of that message, first from within and then reflecting other obstacles from without.
Discovering the Message of God for the People
The Church’s authority works on behalf of Christ, it was instituted by Christ and God has entrusted her with the responsibilities of evangelization. Usually superiors with their cabinets they make discernments on the duties to be carried by their members, they work for God so we must obey them. The Church in which God trusted doesn’t contradict with the idea of God of evangelization. “And I say also unto thee, that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Mathew 16:18). So if a missionary wants to be faithful to the Lord, he must keep the vow of obedience to his superiors. Even how much he may think that, he has a better idea than what was decided upon his ministries or regarding to the place of work, he can’t please God if he doesn’t obey God’s ‘vicars’. Because it is through the Church leaders that God uses them to reach out to other members for assignment of his ministries. In any civil authority as well we observe assistants carrying order from higher authorities to the subordinates. Matters which are contrary to our faith of course we are obliged to disobey even if comes from someone superior to us. Another important point is discerning the will of God while in the field. In each particular activity or responsibility linked to one’s ministry, one must seek what God wants to be done there. One must discover what God would like him to do in that particular office, in this particular duty how God would like him to do. What are the specific problems that God would like him to solve there. Because the work actually is Gods’ he has a purpose that he expects you will fulfill there. He is the one who knows how those problems are to be solved. There is no mission whatsoever may be, that we lack something that God would like it to be accomplished in a particular way; whether it being in the parish, in the seminary, in the school, in the hospital, or elsewhere, God wants to pass his message of salvation through you. To discern what God wants to be done in each specific mission we need the Holy Spirit. He is the one who knows the needs of people. The relationship between the missionary and God must be of outstanding. One cannot perform the work of God while he is far from him, God is sought in the heart. “Jesus answered and said unto him, if a man loves me, he will keep my words: and my Father and I will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him” (John 14:23) God speaks from within us, a good spiritual man will be able to hear what God speaks to him. Surrendering to God is the best way of being most effective in hearing the will of God.
Universal Problems against our Faith today
- The flag that LGBT people use to spread their evil propaganda, a great problem today)
- The number of true believers is declining rapidly
In our current generation today we are speaking about serious problems that threaten the faith even from its foundation. I could sum-up these problems into single term ‘the confusion of distinguishing what is right from what is wrong’. This problem manifests itself in the forms of atheistic elements. For sure no one with right mind would like to fall into eternal damnation, but the way majority of the population of the world live today, is as if ‘God doesn’t exist’, or ‘even if at all he does exist, the rules that he ordered to humanity even if not being observed might not bring any serious consequence’. Other evils challenge even the traditional fundamental doctrines of the church, in fact the words of God himself. Today people are seeking liberty with all efforts to the extent of rejecting even God’s authority over them and in every forms of life. There is a spirit of Gnosticism in the society which results into many other faith problems. Today we hear the demands of rights of man to marry another man, a woman to marry another woman, changing one’s gender, rights to abortion, rights to contraceptives, many Christians who don’t attend masses, or excluding themselves from any religious activity. The spirit of Gnosticism has got roots in the hearts of people. The emerging of prophets and apostles whose backgrounds are not known, and many people flock unto them. Another problem that deepens these problems is some civil popular leaders embracing those evils and propagate them publicly. The meaning of life is sought in selfish fulfilment in as much as it is possible without considering the position of God. There are some civil associations that propagate those evils in the world with money and with professional methods. The bigger threat is when missionaries also adapt such an attitude of the world, the moment when we speak indifferently against these evils, or sometimes even blindly attempting to defend them or trying to find some Scripture verses that may justify them.
It is a work of the missionary today to bring right answers to the people. It is the work of a missionary to assist the congregants to be able to open their spiritual eye, to see things as God sees them. But is this possible if a missionary himself perceiving things as the world perceive? If a missionary doesn’t form himself well, will he be able to see things as God perceives them? Lest the statement of Christ should not be fulfilled, “And he spoke a parable unto them, can the blind lead the blind? Shall they not both fall into the ditch?” (Luke 6:39).
A missionary today Needs Formation
A missionary today is not immune from the impacts of the problems of our contemporary. Boys who have been brought up in the same situations, hearing and seeing the parents and other authoritative figures in such irreligious life styles are the ones who join seminaries. These are the ones who become missionaries probably while their minds not being fully transformed. However, a missionary is not a person who lives out of his society sphere, but rather he still encounters everything that is presented by his society. When things are repeated again and again, there is a danger for wrong things to be perceived as right. Stuffs are propagated through media; especially internets, through forums, through entertainments, social medias, books, processions etc. A missionary today must detach oneself from the world through self-awareness to understand his position as a teacher and evangelizer of others. He must get rid of so many confusions that come from every corner of life by thoroughly reflecting upon them by the light of holy Scriptures, Church doctrines and the Holy Spirit. These confusions will be removed by humbling ourselves before the Lord with genuine objective attitude. While this is possible another effort is needed to distinguish between one’s subjective ideas and objective reality of the Scripture’s message.
A Missionary as the Teacher of the Society
When society fails the church which is missionary in nature should reflect upon oneself to discover where we have failed. Today is like the society is shaping the Church instead of the Church to transform the society. The Church is so powerful and it has penetrated everywhere, if missionaries are serious enough to hold on the Church traditions, we can convert the whole world. State leaders are our faithful, political leaders are our faithful, school children are the part of the church community, when those are transformed the society is transformed. If we don’t form the society into Christian moral standards, the society will transform the faithful into its interests.
Humility in the formation of the missionaries: Humility and diligence is the source of all useful knowledge. A missionary is sent to various places of different cultures, different norms, and in each different society obvious he will encounter various problems of various natures; From the level of continental, national, and within each particular ethnicity, parish level even down to the confined particular locality. With patience a missionary will have to open his mind and heart to learn specific pastoral problems in each place he goes. The similar problem the same methodology may not work in another place, a missionary needs to be humble enough to discover and to learn specific problems and specific methodology that is to be applied in each particular cases. There is as well a unique challenge against humility itself, especially among the more learned, as being revealed by some researchers; “Results from research focusing specifically on the relationship between intellectual humility and religiosity tend to suggest that the more religious one is, the less intellectually humble he or she might be.”[1] This is a problem whereby due to religious status with the intellectual level achieved one feels to be perfect, and so not being humble enough to acknowledge ones weaknesses and needs to change and learn more things. The feelings of overconfidence towards one’s intellect and religious status by resisting even the graces of the Holy Spirit who is the source of wisdom.[2] The center of knowledge becomes oneself. Failing to admit that whatever he earned from formations and from seminary studies has to be complemented by the light of the Holy Spirit. Even from the least educated persons there are a lot we can learn directly or indirectly, from more experienced brothers and sisters regarding particular aspects they will enrich us a lot.
The Difficulties of Evangelizing today
There are several challenges in the field of ministries today. Resistance from the people they serve. The world has radically changed in many forms which gives people different perceptions regarding everything, including their understanding about God. About faith people are more critical than past generations; they challenge every knowledge that seem to interfere their freedom. St. Augustine said “I believe in order to understand”, in our generation this statement seems not easily applicable anymore, religion is perceived as an entity that takes away people’s freedom, the meaning of freedom is distorted. While seeking to be free from God and moral orders they create many complications against themselves which are even very complex to solve; relational problems, psychological problems and spiritual problems. Media has become a teacher of many people especially the young boys and girls and youths in general. People think on religion from the mind set which is already filled with a lot of lofty view.
Vincentians Missionaries Formation in Particular
In the time of saint Vincent de Paul the Church faced the challenges of their time. Vincent in his time found the motive for priesthood being influenced by money and priests living lavishly. He also grew up in the same attitude, but gradually he came to discern that the meaning of priesthood was centered on the salvation of souls including his own. What converted the heart of Vincent into the typical server of the souls and of the poor? Interior in his heart there was readiness to accept the truth, once he encountered the grace of God his attitude was converted, his misconception was cleared. There are some several events that Vincent encountered which changed him. Grace comes to us in pleasant forms and even mostly through pains and even out of trials. When we are faithful God may use even bad events to bring out of them what is good for us. When Vincent travelled to Rome for pilgrimage, he admitted that his heart was filled with the attitude of holiness, when he was enslaved he experienced the pain of sufferers, when he heard the confession of the penitent at Folloville 25 January 1617 and his outstanding preaching convinced many people to confess their sins, the event converted his mind about who he was! when at Chattilon he got the information that one house, the whole members were sick and after acknowledging the generosity of those who helped them he got the idea of starting serving the poor. All these and others gave Vincent a new outlook about his vocation. Vincent challenges us today that we should go back to the origins of the idea of our founder, following Christ the evangelizer of the poor. Vincent’s conversion teaches us today to reflect the meaning of our being Vincentian missionaries, what is the meaning of our priestly vocation and being Vincentian missionary. Vincent and his companions were determined to work in the interior places and obtaining nothing for themselves. Today we are in the world which experiences a rapid urbanization with great imbalance between the villages, and the rich cities, between the poor countries and the rich countries. This poses a great temptation for missionaries on choosing either working in rich dioceses or being ready to work in poor villages and poor countries. Missionaries and even superiors may develop a lot of weak reasons for why opting not to work in some remote parishes or places or poor countries or any challenging places rather choosing to work in more comfort places. Vincent begged the rich to help the poor, the same method is possible today, there are many volunteering organizations today, which help the poor, the church in need, and the poor families, there are individual volunteers as well. There are conflicts in some countries, droughts and famine, poor security in some places, places with diseases etc. Vincent and his fellow missionaries they almost encountered all of these, they were called to work within these areas to bring hope to the marginalized in these areas. It is the same call today, these should be our places of interest, it is for these our congregation was founded. This is what gives significance for our charism. It is through our services will turn the hearts of these poor marginalized to God. As servants of the poor a Vincentian missionary needs to be ready to discover the kind of spiritual and material poverty that affects mostly the people of his place. There are rich people who are critically poor in souls, in fact in most developed regions in the world there is also low practice of faith in its genuineness, who have clung to wealth and ignoring God, or holding on God but partially. We have material poor everywhere but who are spiritually poor as well. People who have lost faith in God because of injustice they encounter, or due to pain of their poverty.
Fr. Reginald P. Uisso
Tanzanian Region
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[1] Peter, C. Hill, “The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion” 31, no 3. (2021) 205–212 (206) http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/hjpr20#.VfBz8BFVikq
[2] Ibid.
