A Reason Open to God

5. The Church—Education in Faith and Community

t 5. The Church— Education in Faith and Community Educating in the Faith From Address to Participants in the Convention of the Diocese of Rome, June 11, 2007 For the third consecutive year our diocesan convention gives me the possibility of meeting and speaking to you all, addressing the theme on which the Church of Rome will be focusing in the coming pastoral year, in close continuity with the work carried out in the year now drawing to a close. The theme of the convention is “Jesus is Lord: educating in the faith, in the ‘sequela,’ in witnessing”: a theme that concerns us all because every disciple professes that Jesus is Lord and is called to grow in adherence to him, giving and receiving help from the great company of brothers and sisters in the faith. Nevertheless, the verb “to educate,” as part of the title of the convention, suggests special attention to children, boys and girls and young people, and highlights the duty proper first of all to the family; thus we are continuing the program that has been a feature of the pastoral work of our diocese in recent years. It is important to start by reflecting on the first affirmation , which gives our convention its tone and meaning: “Jesus is Lord.” We find it in the solemn declaration that concludes 151 152 Faith and Community Peter’s discourse at Pentecost, in which the head of the apostles said, “Let all the house of Israel therefore know assuredly that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified” (Acts 2:36). The conclusion of the great hymn to Christ contained in Paul’s Letter to the Philippians is similar: “every tongue [should] confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Phil 2:11). Again, in the final salutation of his First Letter to the Corinthians , St. Paul exclaimed, “If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed. Maranà tha: Our Lord, come!” (1 Cor 16:22), thereby handing on to us the very ancient Aramaic invocation of Jesus as Lord. Various other citations could be added; I am thinking of the twelfth chapter of the same Letter to the Corinthians, in which St. Paul says, “No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit” (1 Cor 12:3). Thus the apostle declares that this is the fundamental confession of the Church, guided by the Holy Spirit. We might think also of the tenth chapter of the Letter to the Romans, where the apostle says, “if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord,” (Rom 10:9) thus reminding the Christians of Rome that these words, “Jesus is Lord,” form the common confession of the Church, the sure foundation of the Church’s entire life. The whole confession of the Apostolic Creed, of the Nicene Creed, developed from these words. St. Paul also says in another passage of his First Letter to the Corinthians, “Although there may be so-called gods in heaven or on earth ...”—and we know that today too there are many so-called “gods” on earth—for us there is only “one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist” (1 Cor 8:5–6). Thus, from the outset the disciples recognized the risen Jesus as the One who is our brother in humanity, but is also one with God; the One who, with his coming into the world and Faith and Community 153 throughout his life, in his death and in his resurrection, brought us God and in a new and unique way made God present in the world; the One, therefore, who gives meaning and hope to our life; in fact, it is in him that we encounter the true Face of God that we find what we really need in order to live. Educating in the faith, in the sequela, and in witnessing means helping our brothers and sisters, or rather helping one another to enter into a living relationship with Christ and with the Father. This has been from the start the fundamental task of the Church as the community of believers, disciples, and friends of Jesus. The Church, the body of Christ and temple of the Holy Spirit, is that dependable company...