This coming Sunday, April 12th is Good Deeds Day. It’s a day to get out and have a positive impact on the world around you. Your good deeds could affect one person or an entire community. No matter the size of your impact, joining this global movement to be a positive force in the world is a beautiful act. Hopefully, good deeds also encourage those who witness them to spread kindness, offer a helping hand, be present to another, provide representation, care for our environment, and make a difference in so many ways.
For some people, doing good deeds is a seed nurtured by God that becomes a strong call to make a commitment to serve the poor and oppressed in our global community. That call brings them to Maryknoll Lay Missioners, committing three years of their lives to mission work. In the following articles from Maryknoll Magazine, two former Lay Missioners describe the mission call heard by lay men and women. In your good deeds, do you hear something similar?
“The fire alight in us
The lay missioner is part of the collaborative effort of Brothers, Sisters and priests telling the world how close God is to people everywhere, telling how we need to change, to rid ourselves of selfishness and fear in order to be one family.
Like the disciples and early missionaries, the lay missioner is an ordinary person who in saying yes to God’s call has the extraordinary privilege of working with the poor and unevangelized in Asia, Africa and Latin America.
The fire alight in us
Mission is a way of life that brings the missioner into the hearts of people. After all the planning and work, he or she comes to realize that in tenderness is life’s beauty known.
What does my life say to Christ? The missioner tries to respond to the needs of the poor and oppressed by working with them and helping them to recognize their worth and dignity. Specifically, lay missioners are involved in a wide variety of works – pastoral ministry, health, education, agriculture, community development only start the list.
The fire alight in us
As people living in Christian community, lay missioners learn to support and challenge one another. They take their commitment seriously enough to allow laughter its season – laughing with each other and sometimes at themselves.
Lay missioners are people of faith and hope who know that the source of all life is God. They pray, in the words of Brazil’s Dom Helder Camara, ‘We bless You, Father, for the trust You put in us, for the boldness You inspire, for the fire alight in us, that is You in us, You the just.”
Robert Short, Executive Coordinator of the Maryknoll Affiliates
and former Maryknoll Lay Missioner
Maryknoll Magazine, March 1983 p. 3-6
“Lay missioners teach and learn
[…] Howard Engen is a carpenter and mechanic who spent two years working in Alaska with Eskimos and is now training young African men in maintenance work. Barbara Pavelka, a registered nurse, spent two years in the U.S Navy and now works with leprosy patients on the Korean island of So Rok Do.
Bob Short is a former Spanish teacher and guidance counselor. His wife, Shirley, is a speech therapist experienced at working with handicapped children. With their three-year-old daughter they’re now in Bolivia, working to develop Christian communities.
What do all these people of diverse backgrounds and occupations have in common? They are responding to a call to be of service among the poor. [..L]ay missioners […] work with the Maryknoll Fathers, Brothers and Sisters in Asia, Africa and Latin America.
[…] The lay missioners have individual talents and experiences to share with the people with whom they live and work. They have many differences, historically and culturally, but they are united by faith and actions in building a more promising tomorrow – a tomorrow that is Christ-centered, respects the dignity of each individual and responds to the call of community. As laity, they seek to share in building a church that is the people of God. It is a church built not of bricks and mortar, prestige and isolation, but of hearts, humility and involvement. Participation in mission is reflective of a growing and active role of the laity within the entire Church.
For the dedicated people like Howard, Barbara, Bob and Shirley, the call to service changes the question, ‘What does Christ say to my life? To ‘What does my life say to Christ?’ One of the most valuable results of their overseas experiences is not only what they have been able to teach the people, but also what the people have been able to teach them.
There are three things inherent in the call to participate in mission: to be simple, honest and true. Arturo Paoli perhaps says it best when he writes: ‘We do not have to be many or few; we do have to be true and authentic.’”
Text by Mark Koenig and Kathy Wright, former Maryknoll Lay Missioners
Maryknoll Magazine, October 1980 p. 39-41
