I feel like it’s been a long time since I’ve had the joy of presiding at mass on TV here at Mercy Home for Boys and Girls. It’s a real joy to be with you today and in fact in my own life I went through a transition. In my own life instead of being at St. Benedict as pastor, I’m now working with the archdiocese in the cardinal’s process of renewal called, Renew My Church.

And I share that with you today because I think there’s some real commonalities between today’s gospel and also what the cardinal wants to do in the archdiocese of Chicago. As cardinal Cupich has been here about four years now, as he’s been here, he really sees that we’re ripe for continued renewal and continued evangelization. So my job is to help him in that process of going around the archdiocese and looking for how we can perhaps restructure some of the parishes, in some instances combining two parishes with one pastor. How can we look at our structure only so that we could engage in a renewal process that helps us to grow closer to Jesus?

That is in fact what Jesus invites His disciples to do in today’s gospels. He invites His disciples not a renewal but for the first time, to go out to all lands. He sends them out there two by two to go out to all the lands and to tell people about Him. To share the good news of Jesus with all those that they encounter. In fact these similarities I see between what I have the privilege of doing now throughout the archdiocese and what the disciples did is really going out and inviting people to a deeper relationship with Jesus.

Do you know of anybody in your family who might need to renew their own relationship with Jesus? Do you know of anybody who might have fallen away from their journey with Jesus? Today’s invitation from the gospel invites all of us then to be bearers of Jesus to all those we encounter. Think about it. Think about sharing your journey with Jesus with other people who you know and love.

There’s two things that I hear all the time that people tell me. People tell me, “Father Jason hey, my faith is personal and private. I’m not going to share it with anybody else.” I agree with them on the first point. Our faith is very personal. We all have this journey with Jesus that started at our own baptism. But I have to disagree with that second point. It is not private. In fact, we’re called to share that faith in gospel today, to share just like the disciples did, share our faith with those that we encounter.

So for those who say, “My faith is personal and private,” you’re right on the first count, it’s personal and Jesus asks us today to share generously.

The other thing that we hear so often is that we don’t know how to share our faith with others. We don’t know how to talk about our faith. In fact, we’re told as young kids, we don’t talk about our faith, or we don’t talk about politics when we go to cocktail parties. We don’t talk about either one of those two things. So on some level we have to remind ourselves that we are called to talk about our faith in Jesus.

How has Jesus brought you comfort this week? How has Jesus been with you in the midst of pain this week? How does Jesus embrace you because you felt the tinge of loneliness? Jesus invited His disciples to go out there and share the good news, He invites us to do the same. To share our faith in Jesus with those we encounter. Can you do that? If we want to renew our church, we have to.