In 1990, Pope St. John Paul II laid out three circumstances for evangelization:

• Preaching to those who have never heard the Gospel
• Preaching to those Christian communities where the Church is present and who have fervor in their faith
• Preaching to those who are baptized and who “have lost a living sense of the faith, or even no longer consider themselves members of the Church, and live a life far removed from Christ and his Gospel.” [Redemptoris Missio, #33]

Pillar 3 in our Diocesan Plan addresses this third circumstance for evangelization: Go After The Lost Sheep. The Religious Landscape Study conducted by Pew Research Center in 2023-24 revealed that only 29 percent of self-identified Catholics attend Mass weekly. Another 11 percent go to Mass once or twice per month, and 27 percent attend a few times a year. The lost sheep are the more than 70 percent who rarely attend Mass or do not come at all. We all know people in this category. They are our family members, parishioners, neighbors and co-workers. In our own diocese, statistics that are gathered each year reveal that since 2015, the Diocese of Saginaw has lost 30,365 registered parishioners (36 percent) and in the last year (2023-24), a loss of 9,442 registered members. Many of these are the lost sheep.

Where is the Lord inviting you to step out in courageous missionary discipleship? The Holy Spirit given to you in Baptism and strengthened in Confirmation was for one reason – to take Jesus’ message of love, mercy, forgiveness and new life into the world in whatever way the Lord calls you to do so. This is missionary discipleship. We can be assured that the Lord has called each of us into the mission field, each in our own way. In his talk at the Eucharistic Congress last summer, Bishop Robert Barron challenged us when he said, “Your Christianity is not for you. Christianity is not a self-help program, something designed just to make us feel better about ourselves. Your Christianity is for the world.”

The world will always be missionary territory. Missionary disciples have a desire to tell others about their own experience of Christ’s love in their personal life. They want to share the gifts and graces they have received from God, helping others come to an encounter with the Risen Jesus.

In the Joy of the Gospel, Pope Francis exhorts that what is needed are “Spirit-filled evangelizers who are fearlessly open to the working of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit grants the courage to proclaim the newness of the Gospel with boldness in every time and place, even when it meets with opposition. Let us call upon him today, firmly rooted in prayer, for without prayer all our activity risks being fruitless and our message empty. Jesus wants evangelizers who proclaim the good news not only with words, but above all by a life transfigured by God’s presence.” [EG, #259]

This was life in the early Church during apostolic times. Filled with the gift of the Holy Spirit, the apostles and a few disciples went forth in faith and trust, with great hope. They had no Christian institutions (typical of a later Christendom era) as resources. They could have been completely overwhelmed by discouragement, facing crisis from all directions, and even martyrdom. But these early disciples were not discouraged. They were filled with joy and hope. Most importantly, they had great confidence in the Lord Jesus, in their message, and in the creativity and fruitfulness of the early Church. Their task was to avail themselves to be used by the Holy Spirit to grow the Church, and they knew the power of the Lord’s grace to make it grow.

This too, is why the Diocese of Saginaw exists, and therefore, why every parish exists. Our mission is “to courageously proclaim the transforming power of the Gospel so that Christ Jesus may lead people to salvation through his healing, love and mercy.” In other words, “to go after the lost sheep!”

Jesus was the evangelizer par excellence. How did he do it? And what did he share? He shared the love of the Father and what the Father was offering to his people. He loved them unconditionally and deeply cared about each person. Jesus invited people to a new life, a life filled with far more than they could imagine. This always happened through personal, face-to-face contact.

Our third pillar is mission-focused and encourages all active parishioners to “leave the 99 and go after the one lost sheep.” (Lk. 15:4) This requires a personal invitation and accompaniment. The importance of this cannot be overstated. It should be a priority for all parishes who are on mission to share the Gospel. Realizing many people have experienced struggles in their lives that have given them reason for leaving the Church, this pillar provides for active parish-based ministries across the Diocese to support and bring about healing for these individuals – to be messengers of hope.

In this Jubilee Year of Hope, each of us is challenged to rediscover the joy of meeting the Lord Jesus personally and then be sent out to transform our world wherever we are led – to go after the lost sheep in our midst. What a powerful mission for all of us. Who does the Lord want you to bring back?