IN A PREVIOUS ARTICLE I described briefly how the mission work of the Church is managed from the Pope to the Roman Dicastery for Evangelization, to a national mission office in every country, to a mission office in every diocese. But there’s a lot more to it than that.
Photo courtesy of the Pontifical Mission Society
The Roman Dicastery under Pope Leo is organized into four distinct societies:
■ Pontifical Society for the Propagation of the Faith
■ Pontifical Society of the Missionary Childhood Association
■ Pontifical Society of St. Peter the Apostle
■ Pontifical Missionary Union Propagation of the Faith: founded in 1822 by Blessed Pauline Jaricot, it looks to form Catholics to be aware of their mission vocation and to pray and give material support to the Mission Church.
St. Peter the Apostle: founded in 1889 by Stephanie and Jeanne Bigard (mother and daughter), they responded to a plea from the Bishop of Nagasaki, Japan, to help train native priests in mission territories.
Missionary Childhood Association: formerly known as Holy Childhood Association, it was founded in 1843 as a response to news that children in mission lands were dying without Baptism. Its motto is “children helping children,” by means of children praying and offering small sacrifices to help children in the missions.
Missionary Union: founded in 1922, it does not ask for funds as the other Societies do but rather offers support and education for priests and religious so they may be more mission minded.
In the United States, The Pontifical Mission Society (TPMS) gets its orders from Rome and organizes the diocesan mission offices to help support all four of the Pontifical Societies. There is a National Director, and a national board of directors of which our Bishop Kevin Vann is a member. Blessed Fulton Sheen was the national director 1950-1966.
Here in the Diocese of Orange, I was assigned by Bishop Vann as the director of the Mission Office. Together with the Associate Director Lourdes Leon and our Administrative Assistant Gabriela Vazquez, we work to increase awareness of the Mission Church. As our 50th anniversary event motto suggests, “There’s More!” there is more to the Church than what we experience in our local parishes, Catholic schools and diocesan institutions and ministries! We can hardly imagine what life is like in most of the world – the poverty, lack of education, poor access to healthcare, cultural marginalization or downright persecution. We take so much for granted in the Church in the U.S. while many of our brothers and sisters struggle for daily existence. And 5.5 out of 8 billion people do not know that Jesus is the Good Shepherd and Savior of the World! These two realities alone – physical and spiritual poverty – surely must motivate each Catholic Christian to some form of action, some missionary response! Our faith only spreads because people who believe pass it on to people who don’t yet know the Truth! Our diocese even has a place we call a “mission”: San Juan Capistrano, where folks from Spain brought the Good News to the native peoples here 250 years ago! We were mission territory back then! Now it’s our turn to support other missions, now that we are established and thriving as a Catholic community!
The Mission Office strives to increase this mission awareness and invites all to pray and support missionary activities around the world, in 1,130 territories overseen by Rome. We do this by assigning missionaries to your parishes, called the Mission Cooperation Plan (MCP), who come during the summer months to make an appeal to a specific project in their mission. And we do this by encouraging you to be generous with the upcoming World Mission Sunday (WMS) collection Oct. 17-18. That weekend a second collection will be taken up in every parish – not only in the Diocese of Orange, not only in the United States, but in every parish around the world including the mission parishes that will benefit from this collection! And we do this by teaching children about how children, through the Missionary Childhood Association (MCA), in other
countries experience life and faith with age-specific curricula including prayer and activities so that can see a larger picture of the Church as well.
As our diocese celebrates 50 years of life and growth, I pray we will all respond to the Mission Church with a grateful and sacrificial gift through the World Mission Sunday collection Oct. 17-18 to The Pontifical Mission Society. Our support will bless the missionaries serving the Church with the resources they need to show Jesus to those who do not know Him.
Blessed Fulton, pray for us! Pray for the missions!