My encounter with and witness to Christ through service to others

Since the very beginning of the history of God’s self-disclosure, the encounter between the One who speaks and the other one who listens has been necessary to start a new relationship leading to salvation within a determined situation of life. Indeed, from Abram to the prophets, this dimension of encounter has never been absent. God decided to reveal himself to make humankind sharers in his divine life so that the salvific plan he has for humanity might be fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ. Likewise, in the Gospel we have several episodes of encounters which led people to confessing their faith in Jesus. Those experiences are personnel and unique for everyone to whom Jesus Christ reveals himself. 

This reflection presents my encounter with Jesus Christ as a fruit of both his loving gaze on me and my answer to his call. Inspired by the Gospel of John 1:43-51—the call of Nathanael—I do believe that Jesus is always the first to see someone before the latter becomes aware of this encounter, "I saw you under the fig tree before Philip called you." The quality of my answer, which is sustained by faith, led me into a dynamic life as a member of Christ’s body, the Church within my history.

Taken as both events and journey, my encounter with Jesus Christ is to be shared with others not only like a story that happened once in my life but also a witness through my daily discipleship, being a Christian consecrated to the mission in the Society of Saint Francis Xavier. Indeed, this encounter is first of all a gift from God’s "goodness and wisdom."

1. MY ENCOUNTER WITH CHRIST AS EVENTS

Though I was born in a Christian family, I do not take for granted the fact that I was baptized very young. The baptism is my first personal encounter with Christ, when I became a member of his Body. The faith I profess today finds its roots in the progressive awareness of my being son of God. The first years of my very young age, I was brought to church by my parents but at the age of reasoning, I started going to Sundays’ masses (or better Sundays’ celebrations) as well as to the daily Morning Prayer with a kind of inner and personal motivation to be in relationship with Christ. These experiences opened my life to aspiring to a very close intimacy with Christ. Then came the time when I asked myself what would my life look like in the future. Moreover, at the age of 12 years old, I was enrolled as a lector in the celebrations of the Word of God. I can recall how it was helpful for me to be involved in reading the Bible at home with my father who usually asked me to memorize some passages from the Scripture.

From those events, I can understand how the desire to become God’s servant was being revealed to me. However, another significant event was to be effective so that further awareness and commitment would start. In fact, it was on the day of my First Communion combined with the sacrament of Confirmation. I was 15 years old, when a priest passed by our very big parish—without priests for 9 years since the war had broken out—and administrated Sacraments. I could feel not only my joy of having received the Body of Christ and being Confirmed by his Spirit but also the grateful attitude of all the people who were celebrating the same events. I said to myself, "Yes, God wants people like this priest, a priest who shared in God’s Love through his presence among us through his specific vocation."

The decision to start a peculiar formation in view of vocational discernment was for me another event I can share here. At the age of 17 years old, I relocated to a city where I could find a priest to whom I could express what was going on in my life, the desire to be totally committed to the service of God. Keeping in mind both the experience of the First Communion and the memories of the Xaverian Missionaries who had worked in my parish of origin, I was quite sure of where the vocational discernment would start. This helped me discern later about the choice to become a religious missionary as a priest.    

2. MY ENCOUTER WITH CHRIST AS A WITNESS

Convinced that what I am living daily is a journey within a salvific plan of God in my life, I do not separate my experience shared from the experience of God’s revelation which is completely found in Jesus’ Words and Deeds. Therefore, every time I live out the faith in my relationship with God, as well as with others, I am witnessing how the encounter with Christ has affected my whole existence and sharpened my service until I can say with Conforti, "Caritas Christi Urget Nos, the love of Christ impels us."

Through the baptism and religious life as a missionary, I find my identity which gives form to my activities, commitments, convictions, and discernment. These may become witness expressed as a service to others when I always put the love of Christ as motivation in both my being and doing.

With Conforti, I contemplate the baptism and consecrated life in this sense of belonging to Jesus and sharing his love with others.  My case here is to live the missionary Charism of our religious Family as a Christian. "The baptized live in union with Jesus Christ, imitate him, and conform their life to him who came into the world so we might have life and have it more abundantly (Jn 10:10). He has communicated this life to us through Baptism, by which we became living members of the mystical body of which he is the head."

As a Xaverian, the bond of missionary consecration incarnates the service I can witness according to our Charism. There I found "the most worthy and sublime life possible, since it most perfectly resembles the work of the Redeemer."

Let us live our faith in Jesus Christ by serving the people He loves.