{"id":6,"date":"2011-01-14T09:53:08","date_gmt":"2011-01-14T09:53:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/the_new_evangelization\/2011\/01\/encountering-joy-on-becoming-a-catholic-and-being-assured-of-salvation.html"},"modified":"2011-01-14T09:53:08","modified_gmt":"2011-01-14T09:53:08","slug":"encountering-joy-on-becoming-a-catholic-and-being-assured-of-salvation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/the_new_evangelization\/2011\/01\/encountering-joy-on-becoming-a-catholic-and-being-assured-of-salvation.html","title":{"rendered":"Encountering Joy: On Becoming a Catholic and Being Assured of salvation"},"content":{"rendered":"
\nIt was a privilege to minister to “Joy” but it was also a privilege to be ministered to by her. She was prepared to die because she had learned how to live, filled with the faith, hope and love which comes from an ongoing relationship with the loving God in whom we will all find our eternal joy.\n<\/div>\n

\"prayerwoman.jpg\"<\/span><\/p>\n

One of my great joys as
\na Catholic priest is making visits to nursing facilities. The beauty,
\nsimplicity, wisdom and dignity of those who are advanced in years is a source
\nof real encouragement to me in my priestly ministry. In 1999 the venerable Pope
\nJohn Paul II wrote a beautiful letter to the Elderly. In it he wrote these
\nwords: <\/p>\n

“The Christian
\ncommunity can receive much from the serene presence of older people. I think
\nfirst of all in terms of evangelization: its effectiveness does not depend
\nprincipally on technical expertise. In how many families are grandchildren
\ntaught the rudiments of the faith by their grandparents! …How many people find
\nunderstanding and comfort from elderly people who may be lonely or ill and yet
\nare able to instill courage by their loving advice, their silent prayers, or
\ntheir witness of suffering borne with patient acceptance.”<\/p>\n

Pope John Paul II lived
\nthose autumn years of his life of service as a prophetic witness of the love of
\nGod and the beauty of the fullness of Christian life. He understood, as
\nChristians have for millennia, that death is not an end but an entry into the
\nfullness of life. He never ceased to share His wisdom and love for the Lord, in
\nboth word and deed. He died the way he lived, revealing the love of God to a
\nworld hungering to find Him.<\/p>\n

My mother lives in a
\nFranciscan home in western New York. Her faith is an inspiration to me. Often
\nwhen I visit her I give the chaplain the morning off and celebrate the Holy Mass
\nfor the senior community. I then bring communion to my mother and others who
\ncannot regularly attend. Those are some of my favorite times as a priest. Age
\nbrings simplicity and clears away the underbrush that so often impedes us in
\nwalking this journey of life.<\/p>\n

In my home parish I
\ncelebrate the Mass and offer the Sacrament of Reconciliation at a nearby
\nnursing home regularly. This weekend I visited a new resident and gave her the
\nSacrament of the Anointing of the Sick. We will call her “Joy” (not her real
\nname), but an appropriate name for the gift she brought to me. Joy is a humble,
\nquiet Grandma of seven. She is a peaceful soul – she also has advanced stage
\ncancer and expects to die soon. After some pleasant conversation about
\nourselves, I asked her about her reception of the sacraments – whether she
\nreceived Communion, was Confirmed and where she was baptized. “Oh, Father,” she
\nglanced up at me from her wheelchair, “I only became a Catholic very recently.”\n<\/p>\n

I was delighted, after
\nall, at six years I consider myself a recent Catholic too. I came into the full
\ncommunion of the Catholic Church from the Anglican Christian tradition. She
\nwent on, “I was just confirmed five weeks ago!” She pointed to a picture of
\nherself next to a young priest whom I know, and beside the font.<\/p>\n

I asked her how that
\nwas. She told me she was raised in a Baptist family in the south. “They were very
\nanti-Catholic” drawing out the v-e-r-y. “I met my husband who was Catholic, in
\nthe Air Force, and we married. My parents weren’t happy, but eventually they
\naccepted us. For their sake I didn’t join the Church, but we raised our five
\nchildren Catholic. I made sure we never missed Mass” she was emphatic in that
\nlast detail. <\/p>\n

I thought to myself,
\nhow wonderful. For her husband and their children she set aside her own beliefs
\nand tradition, obeying the Church and preserving unity in their home. Joy went
\non, “Then my husband died, and I watched my grandchildren raised Catholic. I
\nthought to myself, ‘It’s time to become Catholic’ I wanted to be sure I was
\nwith them when I died.” She then told me her only surviving sister recently
\ncalled her and told her, ‘I wish I had become Catholic, so that I could be
\nassured I was saved.” “Why do you think she said that?” Joy asked. <\/p>\n

I told her that as
\nCatholics, we have assurance that the way to Heaven, to eternal communion with
\nthe Lord, is opened before us in the Word of God (The Gospel), the Truth as it
\nis taught by the Church, and in the Sacraments. The path to salvation begins
\nwith our Baptism, is established in Confirmation, charted by the Sacraments of
\nReconciliation and Anointing, marriage and\/or Holy Orders and increased by our
\nongoing reception of the Holy Eucharist. Because we have these markers, or sign
\nposts of salvation, we can be assured, if we follow the path marked out for us
\nby the Church, that we will reach the ultimate destination of Perpetual Light
\nand Eternal Rest. <\/p>\n

Catholics have
\nunlimited help in getting there – through the prayers of the Saints, the
\nministry of angels, the guidance of the clergy, the mutual assistance of
\nspouses and the fellowship of God’s people. I told Joy that her sister probably
\ndoesn’t know this much about the assurance of salvation for Catholics, but she
\nlikely detected it in her sister, even if she only became a Catholic “very
\nrecently”.<\/p>\n

It was a privilege to
\nminister to “Joy” but it was also a privilege to be ministered to by her. She
\nwas prepared to die because she had learned how to live, filled with the faith,
\nhope and love which comes from an ongoing relationship with the loving God in
\nwhom we will all find our eternal joy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was a privilege to minister to “Joy” but it was also a privilege to be ministered to by her. She was prepared to die because she had learned how to live, filled with the faith, hope and love which comes from an ongoing relationship with the loving God in whom we will all find…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":370,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nEncountering Joy: On Becoming a Catholic and Being Assured of salvation - The New Evangelization<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/the_new_evangelization\/2011\/01\/encountering-joy-on-becoming-a-catholic-and-being-assured-of-salvation.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Encountering Joy: On Becoming a Catholic and Being Assured of salvation - The New Evangelization\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It was a privilege to minister to “Joy” but it was also a privilege to be ministered to by her. 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