If you could share a message with the entire world, what would you say?
I have often thought about this question, and have asked many people for an answer. Most of the people I asked were Catholic, and while you might think a shared belief would produce a shared answer, the surprising thing is that each response was unique. While one said, “You have a Father who deeply loves you,” another responded with, “Do good and avoid evil.” My parents responded with answers similar in content but strikingly different in tone. My mother quickly answered with, “Repent! and return to God!” while my father responded in a much slower cadence with, “It is never too late to go to God; he will always receive you.”
These answers are all similar and yet unique because they reflect the simultaneous unity and diversity of the Mystical Body of Christ. “We, though many, are one Body in Christ and individually parts of one another” (Rom 12:5). We are all united in one body through “one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all” (Eph 4:5-6).
Yet our unity does not make us all carbon copies of one another. We are diversified by our individual gifts. And thus, “since we have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us exercise them” (Rom 12:6). By sharing our unique gifts, we unite together in glorifying God. The Lord has shown his abundant love personally to you, in a way that only you can share.
In a world riddled with lies and hate, it is tempting to remain silent. We want to shelter our own experience of God’s goodness from the coldness of the world. But to do this is like putting a bushel basket over a lamp; it hides the goodness contained therein and lets the darkness remain (Matt 5:15). The Catechism, on the other hand, speaks of each of the faithful’s duty to share the good news: “By Baptism they share in the priesthood of Christ, in his prophetic and royal mission … that [they] may declare the wonderful deeds of him who called [them] out of darkness into his marvelous light” (CCC 1268).
God has indeed done wonderful deeds for each and every one of us. We have all been united into his one body and yet are individually gifted, each with a unique experience of God’s love that we can share with others. If today you stood before the world, what message would you share?
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Image: Raphael, St. Paul Preaching in Athens
