Share your story!
A call to Catholic evangelization
Share the story of your encounter(s) with Christ here to give witness to His love and hope for a hurting world:
Then Jesus approached and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of the age.”
- Matthew 28:18-20
Words Are Necessary
St. Francis of Assisi is popularly thought to have said, "Preach the Gospel at all times, and if necessary use words." However, this quote is likely an inaccurate paraphrase of Chapter XVII of his Rule of 1221, ("All the brothers...should preach by their actions"). In that chapter, on "Preachers," St. Francis was exhorting his brothers to not preach so as to be heard in a spirit of pride, but to complement their preaching with faithful adherence to life in the Spirit of Christ. In other words, St. Francis was not telling his brothers that words are unnecessary when sharing the Gospel; he was calling upon them not to be hypocrites.
However, the misquote to "Preach the Gospel at all times, and if necessary use words," resonates with our modern, post-Christian world, which demands that nothing challenge its worldly beliefs.
In 2019, Christian research organization Barna Group published a study on generational views of evangelization among practicing Christians. Almost half - 47% - of Millennials either somewhat or strongly agreed that, "It is wrong to share one's personal beliefs with someone of a different faith in hopes that they will one day share the same faith." I suspect there is great overlap among that 47% and the 40% who somewhat or strongly agreed with the statement, "If someone disagrees with you, it means that they're judging you." What's interesting is that an overwhelming majority (96%) agreed that, "Part of my faith means being a witness about Jesus," and that (94%), "The best thing that could ever happen to someone is for them to come to know Jesus."
What we see here is a generation of Christians who feel compelled to witness and who believe that a salvific relationship with Jesus is the best thing that could ever happen to someone, but who feel bound by societal norms that tell them it is morally wrong to share this Good News, to introduce others to Jesus, because - so says society - it is judgmental or intolerant of other beliefs to do so.
What are Christians left with who feel this way? They're left with a variation of the St. Francis misquote: "Preach the Gospel at all times but only through your actions and hope that others will approach you to ask questions about your faith." This has become the only acceptable method of evangelization in our world today. And, I get it. We live in a culture that is increasingly uncomfortable with anything related to religion; along with politics, it's one of the "taboo topics" of discussion in polite company or in daily, brief encounters with people you see infrequently or maybe will not see again. So, the old method of approaching strangers to ask whether they know Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior, while highly questionable whether it ever bore fruit in the past certainly does not today - and very likely drives away those who are approached.
So, in a world where we're called judgmental or intolerant if we share that message of hope, healing, and salvation, how do we do it?
We do it by the example of our lives, because nothing drives others away more than hypocrisy, and we do it with words; the great Catholic tradition of "both/and." But motives matter as does context and method.
Motives Matter
Why do we want to introduce others to Jesus in the first place? If it doesn't come from a place of love for others, from a place of humble recognition of our own brokenness and wanting to introduce the Healer of that brokenness to others who are broken so they too may experience His love and mercy and saving grace, then just stop and reassess. If it doesn't involve wanting to get to know others - who they truly are, what they truly feel, what they've truly been through in life with all the mess, all the sin, all the pain and confusion endemic to our human condition - and to meet them in that place without judgment but with a complete desire to be open to the love of Christ flowing through you to them by the Holy Spirit, then just stop and reassess.
As Marcel LeJeune writes in his wonderful book, The Contagious Catholic: The Art of Practical Evangelization, which I highly recommend:
Evangelization is not something we check off a list. It is not just a meeting once a week at church to do a book study. It is not just bringing someone to a conference once in a while. Rather, we want to be real friends to others and intimately share in one another's lives. That means we care for those around us. We want to know their hearts. Once this happens, others will want to know our hearts as well. What they should find there is the treasure they have always looked for: Jesus.
- Marcel LeJeune, The Contagious Catholic (pg. 15)
All that we do must be done in love. We want to live an authentic Christian life to strengthen our witness, yes, but more importantly because that's what we're call to do by our Lord so we do so out of love for and obedience to Him. We want to share the Gospel message with others because we're called to do so (see Matthew 28:18-20) and because of our love of He who calls us - and because of our love for others who we know need to hear that message.
The Beautifully Contagious Nature of Conversion
Upon learning that I'm a convert, it's almost inevitable that cradle Catholics tell me that "Converts make the best Catholics," presumably because we’re often like children who have discovered something amazing, cherish it deeply, and want to run out to show and tell everyone they meet. As fellow convert Ron Riggins points out in The Wild Goose: The Spirit's Witness (Segment 13), it's not just converts who are on fire, but anyone who has had an encounter with Christ and, through His grace, decides to follow Him. It is the act of conversion, which all Christians must consent to in order to be a disciple of Christ. Marcel LeJeune writes:
People cannot be disciples and accomplish His mission until they consent to believe in Jesus and follow Him. They cannot give consent until Jesus has graced them with an invitation... And they cannot receive an invitation from Jesus until they have encountered Him.
- LeJeune (72)
It all begins with encounter and cooperation with the Holy Spirit to help facilitate that encounter for others is why we witness.
LeJeune tells the story of St. Andrew's initial encounter with Jesus after which he immediately runs to tell his brother, Simon (St. Peter) (see John 1:40-41). He then notes that:
This is what Christian life and evangelization should look like. Not a project or program but a lifestyle born out of the joy of friendship with Jesus.
- LeJeune (16)
Along with the transformation of heart and joy of friendship with Jesus, conversion results in a deep desire for others to experience the same peace, joy, and healing found in that friendship and transformation.
Think of the Samaritan woman at the well who immediately runs off in joy and excitement to tell the people of the town, people who had shunned her, of her encounter with the Messiah. The program The Chosen did a beautiful job of capturing the spirit of John 4:4-42:
Like the delightfully-portrayed uncontainable joy of the Samaritan woman in the clip who cannot help but run off to "tell everyone," those who have experienced conversion - whether a convert to Catholicism, a cradle Catholic who has had an encounter with Christ and gave consent to His graces in his or her life, or any other Christian who has said "Yes" to Jesus - the joy of conversion, the changes we witness in our own lives, the depth of love and grace flowing from our friendship with Jesus cannot be contained but overflows: We need to "tell everyone."
Fr. Dave Pivonka speaks on this powerfully in Segment 13 of The Wild Goose: The Spirit's Witness.
So, if our own initial, and ongoing and ever-deepening, conversion impels us to share the Good News out of love for others, how do we do it?
Context and Method Matter
What we don't do is confront strangers with pointed questions about their beliefs.
It starts with: Who do you know? What do they believe? What's going on in their lives? Do they have the peace of Christ? If not, why not?
Be interested in them, in who they are, in how they feel, in what they've experienced. Love them. Be patient. If enough trust has been established, ask big questions with kindness, love, and genuine concern. Tell them your story. Tell them where you were, what you were like, and what was going on in your life before you encountered Christ for the first time. Tell them about your encounter. Then, tell them about what your life is like now. Tell them about your ongoing conversion and deepening relationship with Christ. Don't sugar-coat. Just be honest and straightforward.
I admit, for a variety of reasons I have trouble with establishing these kinds of deep relationships; the ones I do have are with other devout Christians from my parish family. So, I feel like I don't have a lot of opportunities to witness. Whether I do or do not have opportunities to witness in person is something I need to personally work on and pray on. Perhaps I simply need courage in that area, courage to allow myself to be vulnerable enough to risk rejection with people I know to deepen our friendship to where we can speak on matters of faith.
But, my desire for others to be open to the presence of Christ in their own lives so that they can experience the amazing and miraculous love of our Holy God and receive His graces and blessings drives me to write. So, while I work on my courage in witnessing to non-Christian friends, with God's grace and the Holy Spirit's loving and patient work in me, I will continue to write and I pray that others - maybe you? - will join me in writing.
The Value of Your Story
Whether you tell your story in person or through writing, stories are powerful methods of communicating.
Stories can move, inspire, teach - and they can change our minds. God can even use stories in our conversion. We need to hear stories, and we need to tell them. More than ever, we need to share our stories of how God has worked in us. To quote St. Paul VI, "Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses."
- LeJeune (91), quoting Pope St. Paul VI, Evangelii Nuntiandi (41)
Jesus taught through telling stories. Almost 1/3 of the teaching content of Jesus across the four Gospels are parables, which are stories of everyday life that provide instruction through the use of metaphor.
You might be wondering whether your story is worth sharing.
He has won you for himself...and you must proclaim what he has done for you: He has called you out of darkness into His own wonderful light.
- 1 Peter 2:9
No matter what that calling out of darkness into His own wonderful light looked like - whether it was a dramatic event like the one that turned Saul into Paul or whether you have had a deep abiding faith from your earliest memories or whether the process took years, whatever it looks like, it was and is a work of God, a work of the Holy Spirit through you and so - YES! It is worth telling, it is worth celebrating and rejoicing over. It is worth sharing with the world.
Let's turn again to Fr. Dave Pivonka:
Fr. Dave references John 9, which tells of Jesus healing the man born blind who then witnesses by honestly and directly sharing how Christ healed him. He also quotes Pope St. Paul VI. Here is the extended quote from his 1975 apostolic exhortation, Evangelii Nuntiandi, which means "In proclaiming the Gospel":
Techniques of evangelization are good, but even the most advanced ones could not replace the gentle action of the Spirit. The most perfect preparation of the evangelizer has no effect without the Holy Spirit. Without the Holy Spirit the most convincing dialectic has no power over the heart of man. Without Him the most highly developed schemas resting on a sociological or psychological basis are quickly seen to be quite valueless.
[...]
It must be said that the Holy Spirit is the principal agent of evangelization: it is He who impels each individual to proclaim the Gospel, and it is He who in the depths of consciences causes the word of salvation to be accepted and understood.
It is not our job to bring people to conversion. What we say or write does not need to be "perfect," it does not need to be long or full of references, it does not need to quote Scripture. It simply needs to be your story of an encounter with Christ and how that has changed your life. You simply need to tell your story, directly and honestly, then let it go and let the Holy Spirit do the rest.
The Spirit’s Witness & Kerygmatic Evangelization
God has a wonderful way of bringing passages of Scripture or prayers or resources like books or videos to my attention when I'm praying and thinking through an issue in my life or when I'm contemplating how to write on a certain topic, especially one (like this one, quite honestly) that feels too big for me. (And, I know from speaking with others that this is a very common experience. Our loving God knows what we need when we need it and directs us to it!) I came across the following prayer in the Liturgy of the Hours. This is the Psalm prayer after Psalm 127 in Vol. III, Week 3 of Lent, Evening Prayer, pg. 143:
Our job is only to tell our story of initial conversion, or our stories of ongoing conversion, and to proclaim the Kerygma. We are responsible for no more than that. The rest is up to the Holy Spirit.
The following clip from The Wild Goose: The Spirit’s Witness is longer - around 12 and a half minutes - but well worth the time as Fr. Dave discusses the Kerygma and interviews regular, every day Catholics about their experiences witnessing.
So, let’s break down the Kerygma.
"Kerygma" is Greek for "proclamation" and, in the Christian context, it can be summed up with the following four points; again borrowing from Mr. LeJeune:
"We were created by God to have a relationship with Him. From the moment of Creation, God destined us to life with Him forever.
We, through sin, broke the relationship with God we were supposed to have.
Jesus - fully God, fully human - came to us to heal that relationship by sacrificing His life, rising from the dead, and giving the Church to us so we could continue His saving mission.
We can respond by affirming that Jesus is our Lord, being baptized, repenting of our sins, and living in communion with Him through His Church."
In his 2013 Apostolic Exhortation, Evangelii Gaudium ("The Joy of the Gospel"), Pope Francis writes:
164. [...] We have rediscovered the fundamental role of the first announcement or kerygma, which needs to be the center of all evangelizing activity and all efforts at Church renewal. The kerygma is trinitarian. The fire of the Spirit is given in the form of tongues and leads us to believe in Jesus Christ who, by his death and resurrection, reveals and communicates to us the Father’s infinite mercy.
- Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium, para. 164
Every effort at evangelization must contain the kerygma on some level. Marcel LeJeune lays out a nice framework for sharing our kerygmatic testimony by outlining three basic elements on pages 95-96 of The Contagious Catholic. I would add that before anything, it's essential to start with prayer - always. Start with praise. “Judah [meaning ‘praise’] shall go first.” Praise and thank God for your conversion and the graces He's given you. Ask Him for the graces of humility, faith, trust, and the courage to commit your story to paper or to share it with a friend or loved one. Then, tell your story:
Your life before you knew Jesus
"Give examples of life issues and how you dealt with them before you had an encounter with Jesus that led to your conversion. [...] Give concrete examples. [...] While talking about mistakes, sins, or problems in your past, avoid judging your life too harshly." Reflect the grace and mercy you have received from God in your own life as an encouragement to others who may be struggling with the same issues.When you encountered Jesus; this could be your initial encounter or part of your ongoing conversion process of a deepening relationship with Him. "Concentrate your story on when you encountered Him, and on your conversion. Describe how you felt, what you did or said, and how you reacted. If your conversion happened over days, months, or years, talk about how things changed and talk about the big moments."
Your life after your encounter
"When talking about the difference that Jesus has made in your life, state clearly what has changed. Give examples. What is no longer part of your life? Talk about what you have received. State things you now do differently. [...] Share your hope and the way knowing Jesus is transforming you." Think about writing a brief invitation by telling your loved one or readers in your own words that the blessings and mercy you have received are there for them as well, that Jesus is waiting to take their hand if only they will extend it, if only they will give their "Yes."
Once you've had the conversation or written your story and it's published, ask that the Holy Spirit plant a seed of faith in your loved one or your readers or that He nourishes a seed already planted that needs watering, so that it grows into a deep and abiding faith that will desire to plant more seeds. This is how the Kingdom grows.
Fr. Dave speaks about the importance of being able to tell your story - the three elements listed above - in the context of the Kerygma:
He suggests taking a piece of paper and writing out all the blessings you've received in your life from God. What a great practice for us to do whether we share those blessings with others or not so that we can reflect on God's love and better appreciate His work in our lives. The more you write and reflect, the more insight you will be graced with, and your love for God will grow.
Trusting in God Through the Vulnerability of Sharing Your Story
One of the hardest things about witnessing for a lot of people is the need to admit past mistakes, past sins even, past hurts and struggles so that we can demonstrate just how far God has raised us up out of the mire. Now, I'm not suggesting that anyone go into detail about past sins - that's probably not a good idea - but acknowledging in general past issues and brokenness that has been or is being healed so you can give glory to God and demonstrate His power and love in our lives? That's worth sharing. It's worth a bit of discomfort if it means someone in a similar situation or facing a similar struggle can find hope in our Lord.
I love the Sunday, March 10 reflection based on John 3:14-21 by Sr. Maria Frassati Jakupcak, O.P. in The Magnificat Lenten Companion for 2024 entitled "Celebrating Our Brokenness." In it, she describes the Japanese art of Kintsugi:
Kintsugi artists repair broken tea bowls, but with gold, not glue. The cracks between the pieces are accordingly celebrated rather than hidden. Amazingly, the kintsugi process also makes the bowl usable again, so that in the end it is stronger than before as well as more valuable and beautiful.
God sends His Son into the world not to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. This salvation offered by the Son does not mean that everything broken merely appears to be fixed. Generally, we would prefer it so, so that our sinful works might not be exposed. But though we often prefer darkness to light, we who believe in the name of the Son ought to display the healing Jesus has poured into our lives, the same way a broken tea vessel mended by kintsugi displays the gold. We can boast of our brokenness because it manifests God's glorious healing, clearly seen as done in God.
- Sr. Maria Frassati Jakupcak, O.P., The Magnificat Lenten Companion (pg. 41)
Sometimes, it simply takes stepping out in faith.
Janine McGann talks to Fr. Dave about vulnerability:
The more you trust in the Holy Spirit to guide you, even across unknown waters, the more confidence you will gain in His steady hand and the easier it will be the next time. This is the process of surrender.
So, I invite you to first pray in thanksgiving to God and to ask for His guidance, and then follow the above suggestions from Marcel LeJeune and Fr. Dave Pivonka to write out a list or, better, a narrative description of how God has blessed you, comforted you, shown you mercy and forgiveness, and led you to a place of initial conversion or a deepening relationship with Him through Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit within you.
Using the formula of writing about your life before Christ, your conversion experience(s), and your life with Christ, think about turning that list or narrative into a story. Then, pray on it more. Will you share it with the world? Or, at least, will you share it with the meager audience of this humble blog? Or, will you share it elsewhere, maybe send it to someone you personally know who needs to hear it? Will you use it to reflect on, to be the framework of witnessing to others in person with whom you’ve established a relationship or with a stranger who’s opened the door?
Will your story reach anyone? Will the Holy Spirit use it to plant or water a seed? You likely will never know. But trust. Trust in His power and love to use even our imperfectly-told stories of God's perfect grace and love to touch the hearts of exactly the people who He wants to read it.
Then, once you're ready, step out in faith. As Janine McGann noted in the last video clip above, the Holy Spirit's got your back.
Along with the transformation of heart and joy of friendship with Jesus, conversion results in a deep desire for others to experience the same peace, joy, and healing found in that friendship and transformation.
Share Your Story
Disciples Called to Witness Prayer
Gracious and merciful God, we pray that through the Holy Spirit all Catholics may hear the call of the New Evangelization and seek a deeper relationship with your Son, Jesus.
We pray that the New Evangelization will renew the Church, inspiring all Catholics to “go forth and make disciples of all nations” and transform society through the power of the Gospel.
We pray for all members of the Church, that we heed the words of Christ—“do not be afraid”—and strengthened by the Holy Spirit’s gift of courage, give witness to the Gospel and share our faith with others.
We pray that we may become like the father of the prodigal son—filled with compassion for our missing brothers and sisters—and run to embrace them upon their return.
We pray that all people yearning to know Christ and the Church may encounter him through the faithful who witness to his love in their lives.
Loving God, our Father, strengthen us to become witnesses to the saving grace of your Son, Jesus, our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
Amen.
- The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops
REFERENCES & RESOURCES
Apostolic Exhortations
Pope Francis: Evangelii Gaudium ("The Joy of the Gospel", 2013)
Pope St. Paul VI: Evangelii Nuntiandi ("In proclaiming the Gospel", 1975)
Book
Contagious Catholic: The Art of Practical Evangelization by Marcel LeJeune
See also Mr. LeJeune's non-profit and project:
Video
The Wild Goose: The Spirit's Witness (Segment 13)
Websites
Resource for fallen-away Catholics discerning a return to the Church:
https://www.catholicscomehome.org/
Pope Francis' Apostolic Exhortation, Evangelii Gaudium ("The Joy of the Gospel") on Kerygmatic Catechesis: https://www.vatican.va/evangelii-gaudium/en/files/assets/basic-html/page129.html