Testimonies

As part of a national tour organised by the Bishop's Conference of England and Wales called "Crossing the Threshold," which had a focus on reaching out to lapsed Catholics, 2 young adults from 2nd Friday were asked to give a witness at the Birmingham meeting. Here are the notes from their speech about what Christ and His Holy Church mean to them: 

Today, then, we'd like to share with you something of our encounter with Christ, where we 'put out into the deep'.

R: I remember trying to imagine a world where the Catholic Church did not exist. Perhaps we can try and picture it for a moment. For some that would be a massive sigh of relief; others would have to find something else to moan about and criticize. St. Chad’s right next to us here would be closed up probably turned into flats. Westminster gone. And so on and so on. Apart from this architectural tragedy...what else would be missing? What would the wound be in our lives?

For me a world without the Church would be ultimately and severely deprived. We'd be deprived of hope. No one should be deprived of hope.

The Church as mother of us all is and should be the 'Cause of Our Joy', that title applied to Mary in her litany.

If one day I decided to walk out of the Church for whatever reason, where would this joy, this source of hope come from?

For me, the Church is a great treasure to discover afresh every day.

Every day I wake up and choose again to believe in the Christ and this leads me further into a loving embrace of His Church.

The Church gives us all our greatest calling - to holiness. No ideology, no philosophy or way of thinking in this world has asked this of me- to be a consecrated people, a people called to holiness.

I thank God for the gift of His Church.

C: A few years back I rejected the gift of His Church and thought believing in Jesus would suffice.

I rejected Sunday Mass as it interfered with my social life.

I rejected confession as I could say sorry to God in my heart.

I rejected the moral teaching of the Church as I did not want my life governed by a bunch of old men in red hats who have no idea about real life.

What I couldn't see was that the further I travelled away from the Church, the further away from Christ I became. Without the Church I had created Jesus in my own image and likeness, this counterfeit image left me deeply unhappy and deeply unsatisfied.

After several years a friend, seeing my unhappiness invited me back to Mass. An personal invitation is very very powerful! As I slowly found my feet in His Church I come to realise what I had been missing and how much God loves me!

He breaks all boundaries to draw close to me through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, he becomes vulnerable in the little white host so that he can give himself to me. The very same Jesus who walked the streets of Nazareth waits for me day and night in the tabernacle.

Jesus is waiting for me in the confessional, yearning for the return of his prodigal son. He is waiting there to tell me how much he loves me, to pick me up, to dry my tears, to tell me my sins are forgiven and set me back on the right path.

Only in His church did I fully understand that I am a daughter of the living God, he loves me and he wants the very best for me. That's why he has given His church a moral code, and yes at times it seems like a tall order, but his standards are going to be high because I am his child and a father wants nothing less than the very best for his children.

For me the Church is a true and authentic encounter with Jesus Christ, the God of love.

Nowhere else on earth can such love be found.

Nowhere else on earth can such peace and happiness be experienced. Nowhere else on earth am I invited to the fullness of life.

Only by walking with Jesus in communion with his Church did I come to realise all these things.

I too thank God for the gift of His Church

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Last Summer both of us attended World Youth Day which was held in Madrid, Spain. The Holy Father, believes a lot can be learned from this event to help us with the task of the new evangelisation and we would like to share one or two things that touched our hearts.

The "personal gift" of the Youcat by the Holy Father.

The YouCat, by its very name, reminds us that the faith belongs to you. You are invited to draw further into the loving mystery of our faith.

This publication also reminds us that our faith is reasonable, it can be reasoned. It is not a lofty idea or a 'nice' feeling, but an encounter with the Risen Christ- a concrete reality.

The Pope wants us to receive the faith in its fullness.

In it we find the beauty of the faith in all its fullness: Creed, Sacraments, Life in Christ and Prayer and if we want people to become Holy then we need to have the whole package.

The Holy Father "begged us" to study it, but most importantly the Catechism has to be more than words, it calls us to action; that our lives can become living catechisms

The title YOUCAT takes us to the Pope's particular emphasis on the Youth of the church.

Pope Benedict sees it as his mission to defend the youth, declaring that: "The youth are not as superficial as people think".

He knows young people better than others claim to in the media.

Indeed, he speaks for the youth from a 2000 year old Church that, in knowing the Christ, is ever new.

The youth are not 'superficial' but they are full of JOY and that joy grows naturally from authentically lived Catholicism.

We have seen this great 'sea of joy' from our experience in Madrid.

2 million young people, striving for holiness, their gaze fixed on Christ, their roots in a church whose identity transcends all races, cultures, languages carrying in their hearts a joy which permeated and penetrated every corner of that secular city.

This was Catholic JOY unleashed, the power of the Catholic church in full force....touching hearts, changing lives and witnessing to the greatest love of all.

This love and the passion of our lives for Jesus Christ and his Church attract other people to him. This is the new evangelisation and it is present across our diocese as well as in Madrid.

This great joy of a life lived for Christ in the heart of his Catholic church, our conviction in the Risen Christ calls us to witness wherever we are even in the face of indifference and rejection, as our Holy Father reminded us in Madrid

We see our world broken, hurting, aching and with it we hear a call from Christ to carry his love into the world, to the share the joy that comes from knowing Him.

We know and believe the church is a radiant beacon of hope and an anchor in these difficult times. She is the voice that does not betray the weak or leave the vulnerable helpless.

I think of the memorable 40 Days for Life campaign last Autumn, the many young faces who kept a constant vigil of prayer outside an abortion clinic in the heart of our diocese.

We stood there as a witness to authentic love,

a witness that more authentic values do exist,

a witness to hope,

a witness to the greatest "choice" of all: a witness to life itself.

And this is something that spills over into every aspect of our lives; this witness becomes part of who we are in our places of work, study, with our colleagues and friends.

Through our witness of love for Jesus Christ and His Church, wherever we are, we attract other people to Him. THIS IS THE NEW EVANGELISATION

We leave you with a quote from one of our greatest role models and inspirations, the Holy Father himself, who spoke these words to us at the closing Mass of World Youth Day 2011. May they inspire you in the same way they touched our hearts:

"We cannot encounter Christ and not want to make him known to others. So do not keep Christ to yourselves! Share with others the joy of your faith. The world needs the witness of your faith, it surely needs God."