Editor's Notebook (September 2024)

by Anne-Marie Welsh
09/06/2024

Each time Bishop Lawrence Persico opens the floor for questions when discussing parish restructuring, someone invariably asks what he is doing about evangelization, and each time, his response is a sincere question:

“What are you doing about evangelization?”

Since the earliest days of his tenure, the bishop has said that evangelization is not a program that has a beginning and an end. It needs to be woven into every aspect of our lives.

I have been involved with the production of more than 100 editions of Faith magazine, each sharing the stories of how Catholics are living out their faith in northwest Pennsylvania. In addition, the offices all of us support through our donations to the annual Catholic Services Appeal are driven by the mission to evangelize, educate, care for and serve.

A quick smattering of examples:

• Among its many responsibilities, the Office of Faith Formation hosts annual celebrations for couples marking milestone wedding anniversaries and designs robust programming to prepare young people for confirmation.

• Everything the Catholic Schools Office does likewise springs from its mission, which states, in part, that “students will be invited to know, love and serve God in order to evangelize in a global society.”

• Catholic Charities offers incredible outreach efforts through its offices and agencies and participates in local and statewide events advocating for the poor.

• The Communications Office oversees www.erieRCD.org, social media, the weekly Diocese of EriE-News, and of course, the very magazine you are reading.

And I haven’t even mentioned the works and prayers of the 83 parishes and 29 schools that span our 10,000-square-mile diocese.

So yes, together, we are evangelizing!

Is there room for improvement? Of course. If you don’t feel your parish is fulfilling its mission, step up! Where is the need? Who might join in a response to that need with you?

And if we want to get even more granular, we can remind ourselves that every interaction we have with others — from those closest to our hearts to those who don’t fit into the category of what we might deem an acceptable lifestyle — should be carried out with the love of Christ. This is not an innovative view of evangelization. St. Francis, born in 1181, is credited with the phrase: “Preach the Gospel at all times. If necessary, use words.”

Let’s put that in the context of something most of us already have or likely will experience in our lives: a change in our parish or pastor. As we experience restructuring, are we embracing our reality, grateful we have the opportunity to attend Mass each week, even if it’s not in the parish we’ve always known, the parish we’ve loved, the parish to which we committed ourselves? We may know in our minds that it’s not about the building, or even the pastor. But are we actively working to fully accept the challenges of this moment in our hearts, asking God for the graces we need to start building something new and wonderful?

In this, my last column before retiring as editor of Faith, I look back with deep joy and gratitude for having experienced so much goodness, even as I happily look forward to the coming years. Be assured I will pray that each of us who calls this diocese home, myself included, will recommit to evangelizing every single day, in every single way.

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