MAY72017

“I came so that they might have life and have it more abundantly.” Who wouldn’t want a more abundant life! These words of Jesus are extremely attractive. The Christian message resonates with the deepest desires of the human heart. If that is what the Church is “selling” we should have “buyers” lined up out the door. I deliberately used that commercial image because instead of people flocking into the Church, we are finding a vast leakage from the Church. According to the latest statistics, approximately 44 million people claim to be former Catholics in the US. If ATT lost 44 million customers, there would be a corporate shake up. If the Disney parks saw a drop of 44 million in attendance, they would examine what they are doing wrong and make some changes. Since we believe our “product” is the best possible, i.e. more abundant life, we must do some soul searching on what would cause people to seek some lesser product than the one we possess. Do we in our lives not exhibit what abundant life looks like? Do some of our practices as a Church belie abundant life, e.g. things like the role of women in the Church. Does our public face (our worship, social outreach, political posture) contradict abundant life? Since we as Church want everyone to share in the benefits of faith out of love for them, it is incumbent upon us to do a better job in living and presenting the faith to others.