You are becoming members of the oldest continually existing institution in the world.
We outlived the cruel persecution of the powerful Roman Empire, the Persian Empire, the Goths, and the Vandals.
During the social upheavals of the Dark Ages, we preserved faith, knowledge, art, music, literature, philosophy, and the Sacred Scriptures. In the Middle Ages, we fostered the growth of science and human knowledge by founding the first universities.
Over the centuries, we have outlasted the persecution of the British Penal Laws, King Mwanga of Uganda, the Tokugawa regime in Japan, the Mexican Constitution of 1917, the Nazis, and the Soviet Union. We take a lickin’ and we keep on tickin’.
Currently, our fellow Catholics are living the faith heroically in places of modern persecution, such as China, North Korea, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Syria, to name a few. Eventually, with God’s grace, we will outlive the brutality of ISIS, which has burned our churches, imprisoned our priests, and beheaded our members for refusing to renounce Jesus Christ.
You are joining a group that has been around for a long, long time, and we will be around until the end of history.
We have not recruited you by pressure tactics. Rather, we have respectfully shared our faith with you and allowed you the freedom to respond according to your conscience.
We have not promised that joining our Church would get you an easier life or material prosperity in this world. We have, instead, encouraged you to respond boldly to the invitation of Jesus Christ to deny yourself, take up your cross every day, and follow him.
You did not sign up with us by filling out a form online, or swiping a card, or attending a high-powered rally. You have gotten to know a living, breathing faith community in a gradual process of becoming familiar with our beliefs and practices through contact with regular human beings.
You are joining a community that is not perfect. We are made up of saints and sinners who sometimes fail, and we are in need of constant reform and renewal. We’re still a work in progress.
We do not claim that it is easy to be a Catholic. In a world of individualism, self-indulgence, violence, and moral relativism, Jesus challenges us to a life of continual conversion, self-sacrifice, humble service, and self-control. We offer you the Catholic moral vision of a consistent ethic of life, from conception to natural death, pursuing the common good in solidarity, and respecting the dignity of every human being.
At the very core of the experience of the Catholic faith is a personal relationship with Jesus Christ our Lord. We seek to live in such an intimate communion with him in this life that our relationship with him will endure into eternal life.
You are entering the Catholic Church during the Jubilee Year of Mercy. You have received the unmerited mercy of God, and you have responded to that gift by repenting of your sins and reforming your life. Now, as active Catholics, you must pass on that mercy to those you meet along the way. Wherever you go, people should find in you an oasis of mercy.
This Easter Vigil is not a graduation ceremony. It is initiation – a new beginning in a lifelong practice of faith. Tonight I am inviting you to stick with it for the rest of your life. As Jesus says, “You will be hated by all nations because of my name…the love of many will grow cold, but the one who perseveres to the end will be saved.” (Mt. 24:9-13)
You have come to us from a wonderful variety of different backgrounds. Some come from no particular religion, and some from active participation in another faith or another Christian church. We respect your personal life history, your family, and your upbringing. It has helped form you into the beautiful person you are today.
By becoming a Catholic, you’re not throwing out all that you learned from your parents. You’re building on what they gave you. Your choice to become Catholic is not a rejection of them. It is a response to the action of the Holy Spirit speaking to you in your own conscience, on the basis of your own experience.
Your wonderful gifts and talents bring new life to the Church. We need you and we invite you to be active members of your local parish community. Thank you for saying “yes” to God’s call. I look forward to walking with you along the journey.
As you step forth into this new phase of your life, and you face the uncertainties of the road ahead, remember the words of the risen Lord Jesus: “Be not afraid.”
We believe in God. And God, who has begun this good work in you, will bring it to fulfillment in Christ Jesus our Lord.