Bishop celebrates World Mission Sunday Mass

Bishop Robert Brennan launched World Mission Sunday weekend with a Vigil Mass on Saturday, Oct. 17 at St. Joseph Cathedral.

Attendance was limited because of COVID-19 restrictions. Concelebrating with the bishop were Fathers Robert Kitsmiller, Bill Hahn, Antony Fritzner Valcin and Peter Asantebwana.

Bishop Brennan recognized the diocesan missions office on its 100th anniversary of service.
“Incredible work has been done by generations before us through the missionaries who have grown up in our diocese and who have served, and are even now serving, in mission territory,” he said.

A number of ethnic communities, which included several religious orders, were represented at the Mass.

“It’s a real celebration of the universality of the Church — and the grace of God bringing all the world together in an embrace of love,” Bishop Brennan said.

He added, “And so, on this Mission Sunday, we sense that urgent call of the missions to proclaim the presence of God and the Gospel that he gives us ‘ad gentes,’ which means ‘to all people, to all the ends of the earth.’”

Bishop Brennan offered a reminder that when the diocesan Missions Office was started 100 years ago the United States was considered mission territory.

“Indeed, we have all been the beneficiaries of evangelizers — people who have brought the good news to us,” he said. “On Mission Sunday, the Church asks us to think of a few things. There’s the material support for worldwide missions. Your generosity, your goodness in the Mission Sunday collection is very important. The missionaries — the people who are witnessing to the truth of the Gospel in other places around the world — will use that to better the lives of the people they serve, sometimes just for basic human needs.

“We’re asked to pray in a very particular way for those who are serving in mission territory all around the world. For they represent us. Then, we are asked to feel that sense of missionary urgency, ourselves, in our own lives and realize that we’re also missionaries, that we bear witness to the Gospel in our relationships with one another.

“And so, taking the truth of the Gospel today, we see the image and likeness of God in one another and realize it is the image and likeness of God within ourselves.”