Diocese of Joliet's Missionary Disciples Newsletter
Diocese of Joliet's Missionary Disciples Newsletter
Katherine Coolidge, of the Catherine of Siena Institute, Talks about One of the Keys to Missionary Discipleship: Accompaniment
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Katherine Coolidge, of the Catherine of Siena Institute, Talks about One of the Keys to Missionary Discipleship: Accompaniment

Welcome to another issue of the Missionary Discipleship newsletter. I hope the content I’ve been sharing so far has been helpful. Ultimately, at the heart of all the previous, and upcoming, weeks’ issues is love.

God sent us a Savior out of love. Jesus’ ministry was full of love. When He forgives, it’s out of love. When He shows mercy, it’s out of love. When we evangelize, it is out of love. When we encounter others, it needs to be done in love. When we accompany others, let us love them where they are, but speak and witness to them the Truths of the Gospel.

Accompaniment is a word that Pope Francis uses a lot. So what is? How do we accompany others?

Katherine Coolidge. the Director for Parish and Diocesan Services for the Catherine of Siena Institute, has great experience in this area of missionary discipleship, and she shares it in the audio interview above. It’s well worth listening to when you have time.

If you don’t have time, then read the content below as encouragement and inspiration for when you accompany others.

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To love one another in the highest sense of the word is to wish that person the eternal possession of God and to lead him to it.

— St. Francis de Sales

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Karol Wojtyla’s pastoral strategy of “accompaniment” was an attempt to get beyond the pattern of sporadic encounters between priests and young people that frequently resulted in the priest being suspected of prying into the crevices of conscience. “Accompaniment” was a way of “walking with” young adults, of helping them unveil their humanity by living through their problems with them. As a colleague would later put it, Wojtyla “tried to accompany someone else in the problems; he was open to revealing the humanity of another.”

— From George Weigel’s Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II

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On Oct. 21, 2014, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI sent a letter to the Pontifical Urbaniana University, Rome’s academic institution dedicated to evangelization. In this letter, he raised the question whether or not mission, bringing the truth of the Gospel, is still relevant in a world of so many diverse religions. He asked whether or not dialogue should replace mission. He answered that question by saying, “Joy demands to be communicated. Love demands to be communicated. The truth demands to be communicated… We proclaim Jesus Christ not in order to procure as many members as possible for our community, and much less for the sake of power. We speak of him because we feel the need to transmit the joy that has been given to us.”

In accompanying others in their life journey, we listen, we dialogue, and we stand before them with an open mind. This does not mean that we cast off the historic creeds of the faith. This does not mean that we deny the moral teachings of the Church. No, it means that we take our place with others in the pursuit of the truth. Accompaniment requires an open mind. But, as G.K. Chesterton astutely remarked, “Merely having an open mind is nothing. The object of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid.” And, the truth of the faith that we share with others is the solid food that nourishes the mind, the heart and the soul and leads to eternal salvation (cf. Hebrews 5:14).

— From the Diocese of Paterson

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“Catechists of adults need to be people of faith with an evangelizing spirit, a zeal for God’s Kingdom, and a commitment to lifelong formation.” They should be able to accompany other adults on their journey of faith, to draw them more deeply into the Christian life, to guide them in Christian prayer, and to help them relate to the truths of the Catholic faith to the circumstances of their everyday lives.

— From the National Directory of Catechesis

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I never look at the masses as my responsibility; I look at the individual. I can only love one person at a time, just one, one, one… So you begin. I began; I picked up one person. Maybe if I didn’t pick up that one person, I wouldn’t have picked up forty-two thousand… The same thing goes for you, the same thing in your family, the same thing in your church, your community. Just begin — one, one, one.

— St. Teresa of Calcutta

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“Genuine spiritual accompaniment always begins and flourishes in the context of service to the mission of evangelization” (EG, 173).

The pope explains further: “Spiritual accompaniment must lead others ever closer to God… to accompany them would be counterproductive if it became a sort of therapy supporting their self-absorption and ceased to be a pilgrimage with Christ to the Father” (EG, 170).

It’s in the dialogue, the communication, that the Lord shows us the art of accompaniment. Pope Francis writes: “Listening, in communication, is an openness of heart which makes possible that closeness with­out which genuine spiritual encounter cannot occur” (EG, 171).

But communication is a two-way street, a true dialogue. It doesn’t mean smiling, listening, nodding along and giving tacit approval. Nor does it mean a lecturing that most likely is inappropriate at an initial moment of contact. And yet, He who is Mercy walks with them. What does this mean? It means beginning on the natural level and moving to the supernatural, through the Spirit working in our midst, to engage the other on a deeper level, not just of emotion — where most debates take place — but also on a level of soul.

What does this accompaniment do? It leaves these disciples wanting more. Jesus vanishes from their midst. [This is a reference to the Road to Emmaus passage in the Gospel.] He is now recognized by them in the breaking of the Bread, exactly how we now recognize Him in the Real Presence in the Eucharist.

These disciples of the Lord Jesus become “missionary disciples.” This is exactly what Pope Francis is calling us to become in “Evangelii Gaudium.” Accompaniment might be the best tool in the workshop of the New Evangelization if we are to help the Lord create missionary disciples in the Church.

— From an article written by Father John P. Cush called “Honing the Art of Accompaniment”

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