Our Day of Evangelization on Saturday 24 August is getting very close now. We are in the final days of recruiting as many helpers as possible so that we can reach as many souls as possible on the DOE day itself. To this end, at most of last weekend's masses members of the DOE teams made a personal appeal to the wider parish family to ask for more good souls to come forward to join us in this prayer-filled and Spirit-led effort.
In a most profound talk at 4 PM Mass on Saturday, Joe DePietro of our DOE Publicity Team spoke beautifully and explained how our DOE efforts completely align with both Church teaching and the wonderful witness of our Holy Father Pope Francis. The DOE Parish team wanted to share Joe's talk. Please see below...
"My name is Joe DePietro.
My family and I have been parishioners at St. Joseph’s and now SVP since
2006.
As you know, SVP Parish is doing a Day of Evangelization on
Saturday August 24th from 7:40am-2:00pm. On “The Day” we will go Door to Door
throughout the streets of Attleboro for Christ.
Our Goal is to organize up to 200 Catholics to support the
Day of Evangelization. Up to 100 of these people will support the day, while up
to 50 pairs of 2 will go and knock on up to 2000 doors throughout our parish
boundaries, and make up to 1000 contacts with people, to gently and lovingly
invite them to come and be a part of our Church. So far, there are about 90 people registered
(some have volunteered from other parishes), but we would like to invite more,
if you are so called.
Who are we doing this for?
We are doing this for Christ and his Church, to build the Body of Christ
and to bring Christ to our world, which is in desperate need of the hope and
joy that only Christ can give.
Why am I doing this? I
have never gone door to door to evangelize before but I am going to do it
because, I want to give a witness to Christ and what he has done in my life,
and to personally invite others to partake in the Sacramental Life, what our Parish community offers and what our
Church teaches.
What feeling will I get?
I imagine it will be a spiritual and uplifting experience, even if I can
help move just one person, closer to, or on a path towards our Lord and Savior.
The Catechism says, paragraph 1285 which is the first
paragraph on the Sacrament of Confirmation says: “as true witnesses of Christ”,
the confirmed “are obliged to spread and defend the faith by word and deed.”
1 Peter 3:15-16 says, “Always be ready to give anyone who
asks you for a reason for your hope, but do it with gentleness and reverence”…
In closing, we need to Evangelize because Christ commands us
to do so when he said in Matthew 28:19 “go and make disciples of all nations”. This was the theme of World Youth Day in
Brazil, where at the closing Mass on July 28th, Pope Francis reminded
us to “Go, Be Not Afraid, and Serve”. He
states that Christ through the Holy Spirit helps us to do this, even if we
don’t feel ready, as God said to Jeremiah, who feared he could not speak
because he was too young. God said, “be
not afraid for I am with you to deliver you” (Jer 1:7, 8). Our Pope emphasized that Jesus did not say
“one of you go”, but he said “all of you go”, go and make disciples of all
nations. Finally he said to do this, not
in isolation, but as a community, with the communion of saints and in the companionship
of the whole church.
In the case of the Day of Evangelization, happening on
Saturday August 24th 2013, at St. Vincent de Paul Parish in
Attleboro, we are choosing to be obedient to our Shepherd.
I’d also be happy
to answer any questions, after Mass. Thank
you and we pray that you will participate in this parish event in any way you
can!"
Thank you to Joe and all the other members of our DOE teams who were willing to offer DOE testimonies at last weekend's masses - Deacon Tony, Ruben Chevere, Mary Hayes, and John Davis.
