Collective Examination of Conscience - May 2008

After so many months of preparation and anticipation our Festival of Faith was finally celebrated May 8 to 10 at the Orange County Convention Center.  I sincerely thank all the staff of our chancery, our parishes and schools, our other institutions who put in countless hours to give shape and substance to the Festival of Faith.  Special thanks also as due to all the volunteers, including those from the Knights of Columbus and the Diocesan Council of Catholic Women.

Of course, since this was our first ever “Festival of Faith”, we have learned many lessons and certainly those lessons will well serve us for any future festivals.  (Our 50th anniversary is only 10 years away after all.)  Nevertheless, in these days after the Festival, although these days did not afford me much time to rest, I have prayerfully reflected on the experience.  In my reflections, I returned to my pastoral letter, “The Vision Revealed:  Witnesses to Hope, Alive in Christ”, written at the conclusion of our Diocesan Synod in August 2006.

In that letter I proposed that all our synod’s plans and priorities – indeed, all that we do in the Church and for the Church - should be subjected to a simple test, a “collective examination of conscience”. This “test” has no “trick questions”; but the questions can serve as a tool to evaluate the Festival of Faith as well as our Church activities.    

• Does this activity bring us closer to Christ and his Church?  Does it help us to know Christ and to make ourselves known to Him?
• Does this activity motivate us to love Christ and His Church wholeheartedly – with a renewed fervor and zeal?
• Does this activity serve Christ in the person of those who are suffering, lonely, outcast, vulnerable or poor in any way?
• Does this activity increase awareness of the gifts we have received from Christ in his Church?  Does it challenge us to develop and share all that we have received from Christ’s bounty and to return our gifts to the Lord with increase?
• Does it help us to be more authentic and effective Witnesses to Hope, Alive in Christ?

With a holy pride, I think that we can answer these questions in the affirmative with regard to the Festival of Faith.  A shuttle bus driver who took participants from the Convention Center to their cars was heard to remark:  “I am a Muslim but I want to know what you people were doing in there that everybody is leaving so happy”. As Pope Benedict has insisted, we evangelize most effectively when we communicate to others the “joy of our encounter with Christ”.  And, if the Festival of Faith – as the center piece of our Year of Evangelization – did this, then it was indeed Festival was a rousing success.

As Catholics “alive in Christ” knowing Jesus Christ by faith is our joy, following him is a grace and passing on this treasure to others is a commission that the Lord has entrusted to each one of us in calling and in choosing us. For the thousands who attended, the Festival of Faith was a joy, a grace, a treasure received and shared.