November 2022 – Call to Family, Community and Participation
With Thanksgiving Day later this month, the official holiday season is off and running. A time of great joy, it can also be an extended period of stress. Being with our families and neighbors can feel especially overwhelming during these months, and a call to family, community and participation can feel like part of an enormous pile on.
So let’s consider what the call is not. We’re not called as individuals to minister to the entire world. Neither are we called to restore every person brought before us. Both of those jobs belong to Christ Jesus.
So who are we called to serve? Recognizing that we live in specific times and places, we can bless those directly in our field of vision. And how? Let’s begin with an acknowledgement that we are all created in our Father’s image and are deserving of dignity if for no other reason. From there, we can participate simply by spanning loneliness over a cup of coffee, offering a jacket to the one without or sending a note of appreciation to the one few really see.
As we accept the call and step forward, we can be thankful God has given us such an important command. Love: In its perfection there is no fear. What a gift to an anxious, overwhelmed world.
This I command you: love one another.
John 15:17
Father God,
We love only because You loved us first. In this busy season, fill each of us with an outpouring of Your Holy Spirit to overflow to those around us. Help us see expressed and unexpressed need among those You bring before us.
- Help us enter this holiday season with eyes fixed on You
- Lead those struggling with emotional health to Catholic Charities
- Use hard situations in all our lives to transform hearts
- Provide the resources to care for Your people
- Let the assistance Catholic Charities provides lead to long-term stability and point to You
In Christ name we pray. Amen.