How to Teach the Faith Why don't we ask St Paul?

Since we have by an act of mercy been entrusted with this work of administration (evangelisation) there is no weakness on our part.    On the contrary, we will have none of the reticence of those who are ashamed, no deceitfulness or watering down of the Word of God, but the way we commend ourselves to every human being is by stating the truth openly in the sight of God............We are only the earthenware jars that hold the treasure, to make it clear that such an overwhelming power comes from God and not from us.      St Paul 2Corinthians 4:

I remember one time in the not so distant past a number of Catholics watching some videos on the Catholic Faith.   A number of people who were with an RCIA meeting came into the room to have coffee.   They saw part of the video and one remarked that this was what he was interested in.  Others agreed.    At that time the RCIA programme taught very little of the Catholic Faith since 'scholars' had decided to take "People from where they were" which seemed to mean in practice that everyone who wanted to be a Catholic had no Christian background whatsoever and had to be taught the basics or in St Paul's words "a watering down of the "Word of God"   The one in five who decided to pursue the course, which took some time to change despite the obvious 'failure', were of course not called back 'to be brought further forward'      I hasten to say that under our new bishop there have been many changes in parishes and the treasures of the Faith are being taught and many leaders now state the truth in the sight of God.

There still remains however a 'reticence of those who are ashamed'    "No, no, do not talk about the Church as Infallible"   "No, do not talk about the Real Presence it is too much for them to grasp."  "No, do not talk about Mary, she is just a woman   It could put them off".   The four out of five candidates in the past probably left because they were not being told about such things.  There is a high probability that indeed they did see this reticence as the deceitfulness that St Paul was talking about.

St Paul is our model in evangelisation.   He preached "Christ and Him Crucified, a stumbling block to the Jews and to the pagans madness"   Christ had given him this gospel to peach and he did not wast his time on human wisdom and human thinking.    It was not his Gospel but the Gospel of Christ.  He was the earthenware jar holding the treasure but the power of conversion comes not from our thinking  but from God Himself.


         

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