September 4, 2024

By Father William Muench
NCC columnist

I love John 6. We have seen John 6 the past few Sundays at Mass. I consider that it was important for people of the parish to realize this message in its completeness. So, I gave them homework: I asked them to read and meditate on this chapter of St. John’s Gospel, John 6. This is an important teaching of Jesus. It’s Jesus’s own words concerning our sacrament of the Holy Eucharist.

The final story in John 6 is that some of Jesus’ disciples decide that they cannot accept this teaching of Jesus. John tells us that these disciples no longer walked with Jesus. They had lost faith in the Lord.

How is your faith in Jesus and his message? So, let’s talk a little about faith today. In John 6, Jesus asks the 12 apostles whether they will continue to walk with him. Peter speaks up, “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.” Can you agree and say this with Peter.

So, the question is, “do I have faith in Jesus?” I believe that our Catholic faith in Jesus and in the message of the Lord must be a personal decision; our commitment is to the acceptance of a person, and Jesus is that person. Faith is not something inherited. Faith is not something I just take for granted. Faith is a personal decision that we make for Jesus as Our Lord and Savior.

Faith that Jesus came to this world to reach out to us all, to reach out to a community – the community of all people. Today, Jesus continues to reach out to bring his message in faith to this human community – to our families, to all the parishes of our Catholic Church. Jesus continues to make our faith strong and alive through this Catholic Church. Each time we attend Mass, we are deciding for Jesus, and we are making an act of faith.

This is the very reason we participate in Mass each Sunday. As we come to the altar of the Lord to celebrate the Holy Eucharist, we continue to find and to grow stronger in our faith. We want to be the People of God. We want to do all that we can by living good Christian lives and making our world a better place. We come together united as a community, as a family with saints, with sinners, with the joyful, with the sad, with the troubled, with those in crises, with those in need. We can come together as a powerful force, faith filled and ready to act in the name of our savior, Jesus. I often think as the priest celebrant at Mass, looking out at the congregation participating with me at Mass, how powerful it would be if I could convince all of these people to do something special for God today; I could change the whole world today. Would I ever be able to give them enough faith in Jesus and his readiness to lead them?

We, Catholics, all declare our faith at each Sunday Mass when we proclaim the Creed together. The Creed reminds us of all we believe in faith. The Creed unites us into a powerful force as the People of God always ready to act, to do something good, to truly live well. Each time we say the Creed together, we proclaim our faith to ourselves, to each other, to all who will listen, that this people of God believes in faith all that God asks of us, and we’re ready to love God above all and to love our neighbor as ourselves. This people of God is always ready to walk with Jesus.

Our faith makes us this people of God – bishops, priests, dedicated religious, dedicated lay men and women – united together in faith, we are dedicated to bring Jesus to this world out there, to our own community. We are the people of God.