Going Forth Mass
June 2010
Today’s celebration is called the ‘going forth mass.’ When you ‘go forth’ you go out to be somewhere or to do something.
Now when you made your first Holy Communion about three weeks ago I told your parents about what it meant for them. I reminded them of what Jesus said; ‘let the little children come to me and do not stop them’ he said. This means that your parents will bring you to Jesus by showing you how to live like good human beings, by bringing you to church so that you can thank Jesus as one family, by teaching you to pray at home, that is to talk to Jesus from time to time.
But now you are ‘going forth.’ Going forth to do what? To be what? To go where?
Your parents bring you to Jesus as we saw above and you must bring your Mum and Dad to Jesus. It is a two way thing; they bring you to Jesus and you bring them to Jesus. I have seen so many children who have brought their parents to Jesus. Parents can be very busy and forget about Jesus. Very often it is children like you who tell their parents ‘I want to be Baptised,’ I want to make my first holy communion,’ I want to know how to pray,’ ‘I want to go to church’ etc. ‘Who is Jesus?’ you ask,’ ‘Who is God?’ you ask. ‘Why do we not pray?’ you ask.
So today you are going forth. You are going forth to bring your Mum and Dad to Jesus.
You do not want Jesus looking at you and saying ‘let your Dad and Mum come to me and do not stop them.’