Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dear Friends,

In today’s Gospel Jesus sends his disciples, us included, on mission to proclaim the kingdom and to seek out the lost. As disciples of Christ, we are called not only to be in relationship with and to learn from him, but also to go out and to share him with others. When we look around our world today, it is not difficult to observe that so many people around us have not encountered God or understood the life changing message of the Gospel. Sometimes we can be tempted to make hasty judgments when we see those who seem astray, or we ourselves can feel judged when we drift away from God. But Jesus doesn’t look at his lost sheep with judgment or condemnation; his heart swells with love and pity and a desire to draw them close once more. And how does he go after the lost? He sends us.

“The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few.” All around us there are thousands of souls with an eternal destiny, who were made to know how loved they are by God. If every person knew God’s love, and the lengths he has gone to to save them, our entire world and culture would be profoundly transformed for the better. This might sound like a lofty dream, but Jesus doesn’t think so. He sends each one of us out, just like his apostles, to make his message known and to bring this transformation about. The disciples in today’s Gospel are given miraculous gifts for their mission; Jesus empowers them to heal and to save, making them extensions of his very self. He does the same for us: he empowers us, he sends us out, he calls us to mission—all that’s left for us is to decide to go.

Jule Coppa, Penn Campus Minister