Only by witnessing

I cannot recall who spoke in his homily these words in a Mass in the US: Only by witnessing can we be called Catholics. He considered it as a measure of the depth of our faith if we are not afraid or ashamed to publicly show or express our Catholic faith.

Indeed, the lives of all the saints show that their sanctity is filled with an abundance of expression of their faith, some by dying a martyr’s death, or by serving the poor and the wretched or doing works that make people know they are followers of Christ.

The homilist spoke of the simplest act of making a sign of the Cross and saying the prayer before and after meals in a restaurant or in public.

In his homily just after the Vatican announced that Pope Benedict XVI has elected him cardinal and after he had returned to his archdiocese in Manila, Cardinal Elect Archbishop Luis Tagle noted that, in the past drivers, even jeepney drivers, would make the sign of the Cross when they passed by the church.

I also recall people making this sign when they pass by a cemetery or a funeral procession. But as the Cardinal Elect said, this practice has disappeared.

What happened? Is it secularism? Is it being “modern”? Or are we afraid or ashamed people make fun or ridicule us?

This column cannot provide the answer because only each one, every Catholic can answer that.

On the other hand, there are people who are unafraid and unashamed to show the world they are Catholics. Making the Sign of the Cross distinguishes us from other religious believers.

When Pope Benedict XVI announced in the Vatican on October 11 the formal start of the Year of Faith, he said in a Mass at the St. Peter’s Basilica on October 16 which concluded the conference on the “New Evangelization” that the aim of the celebration of the Year of Faith is the “restoration of the strength of the faith in traditionally Christian countries now dominated by secularism” and the “profound crisis of faith that has affected many people.”

This observation is not new rather in 1967 Pope Paul VI also “underline the value of such public proclamations of faith”. This was the 25th year of the Vatican Council II which also opened the Church to a dialogue with the changing world.

The council was, the Catholic Spirit (10/11/12), the newspaper of the Diocese of Metuchen of New Jersey, said intended to “updating, not because the church felt threatened but because of its great desire to share Christ with others.”

The present Pope had been emphasizing the need to share this faith with others who have not heard of it. What better way of sharing this faith that being witnesses to it?

Pope Benedict XVI also said that we should not consider our faith as a ‘private act” but rather that in this Year of Faith “religious communities as well as parish communities, and all ecclesial bodies old and new, are to find a way … to make public profession of the Credo.”

We say the Credo (I believe) in every Mass and in every start of the Holy Rosary but many mumble it when a deeper prayer of it will reveal our duty to share this faith with others. If this faith is good for us, should we not share it?

This is the challenge of the Year of the Faith and the only way for us to share it is to be witnesses, to proclaim this belief.

We cannot all be catechists or members of the clergy, but it takes a little to show our Catholic belief. Sure, there are people who proclaim they are Catholics but they make distinctions between their Catholicity and their public lives as if they can dismember their faith from the public life, like sorting out their school uniforms and their beach towels.

Our public lives should reflect our faith, indivisible.

The observation of Cardinal Elect Tagle reflects that “faith is now being subjected to a series of questions arising from a changed mentality,” the Catholic Spirit noted. The newspaper also quoted the Holy Father saying “that while some people in today’s world are openly skeptical about religious faith, many others are simply looking for meaning in life.”

This is our challenge, to reach out to those seeking for “a meaning of life” and the best and only way is for us to be the first to show and be witnesses to our faith that others, seeing our faith, maybe attracted to it.

The Pope said that the Year of Faith should “arouse in every believer the aspiration to profess the faith in fullness and with renewed conviction, with confidence and hope.”*

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