By CatholicVote | Created at 2024-10-23 00:12:58 | Updated at 2024-10-23 22:30:45
22 hours ago
CV NEWS FEED // At the Diocese of Brooklyn’s annual Mass for World Mission Sunday on October 20, Father Thomas Ahern honored several local Catholic school students for raising funds for the Church’s foreign missions.
The Tablet reported that students from St. Sebastian Catholic Academy in Queens and St. Bernadette Catholic Academy in Brooklyn were honored with framed “high donor” awards for raising more than $12,000 each to support the Missionary Childhood Association, one of the Pontifical Mission Societies. The Mass, held at the Co-Cathedral of St. Joseph, underscored the importance of evangelization and the critical role of donations in helping missionaries throughout the world.
Father Ahern, who serves as the director of the Propagation of the Faith Office for the diocese, highlighted how donations like those raised by the students support priests and religious in the foreign missionaries in their work of bringing souls to Christ.
“The goal is to come to know and love Christ, in the Eucharist, in the Scriptures,” he said during his homily.
One student, Jeremy Amare, a seventh-grader at St. Sebastian Catholic Academy, reflected on his involvement.
“I didn’t know much about mission before,” he said. “We have to help raise money for the poor people, that’s it.”
In addition to the high donor awards, St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic Academy in Woodhaven was recognized with the Banner Award for contributing at least $1,000 in 2023. Father Ahern praised the generosity of the students and their families, explaining how their efforts help missionaries reach those in need, even in the most challenging parts of the world.
Last year, the Diocese of Brooklyn raised approximately $180,080 for the cause. Father Ahern shared personal experiences from his visits with missionaries in Nigeria and Kenya, where the churches are so packed that they can’t build them quickly enough, he said.
Father Ahern noted that priests from those countries become missionaries to the United States, and that despite their own poverty, local parishioners contribute what they can for missionary work.
He recalled one missionary priest explaining, “We want to receive a blessing for giving, even though we don’t have anything. We want to help those who have even less than we do.”
Pope Pius XI instituted World Mission Sunday in 1926 as part of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith, one of the four Pontifical Mission Societies. It was designed as a day of universal solidarity. The first worldwide collection took place the following year. Ever since, it has been an annual day for Catholics across the globe to provide support for more than 1,100 dioceses, particularly through local churches that serve the poor and bear witness to Christ.
