My place in this world

Christians are known for trying to make converts, and this is an aspect of the effort known as the “great commission.” The great commission is in some sense is the calling of everyone who is a disciple. How actively we go about this, in what way, and with whom, depends on the circumstance. In the Catholic faith, for instance, we have developed (partly in response to our own nefarious history at forced conversions and persecutions) a very tolerant outlook on other religious traditions, regarding the Jews as our elder brothers, the Muslims as participants in the salvific plan, as with all people “who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience.”

In the world of North American society, Christians really don't need to be in the convert-making business, since Christianity is already a majority disposition. That doesn't stop people, of course. Christians spend a lot more time on each other, I think, than on anyone else! (It is amazing the time some invest in trying to convert each other to their specific denominations.)

The truth is that some insecurity lies in the motivations of Christians who witness. But Christianity does not even need to be a majority religion – it thrives in many places without proselytizing. In Lebanon and Syria, ancient Orthodox and Catholic communities continue to pass on an unchanged Christianity little different from the kind observed by ancestors a thousand years gone, in Muslim-majority societies.

But not all proselytizing is the selling of spiritual vacuum cleaners. When St. Paul visited Athens two thousand years ago, he told the Athenians that he admired the fact they were religious, and then proceeded to make a gentle case for God, "so that people might seek God, even perhaps grope for him and find him, though indeed he is not far from any one of us" as he put it.

That's always been my angle. I have no interesting in selling someone something, for spiritual goods are not for sale. But I have noticed for some time how broken so many people are. People long for something - they feel like they are roaming, as Michael W Smith the singer once put it, looking for their place in this world. Why am I here? Why have the things that have happened to me taken place?

In my own life, yes, I try to answer these questions with the person of Jesus. It is difficult to explain - and has to be experienced - but Jesus is a healing figure, a rain of compassion and mercy, freeing to those who have been imprisoned by the unfathomable.

Not everyone can accept or hear this message. But for those who 'have ears to hear' (as we put it in our religious language), it is good news. For me, and I hope for the people I sing for on Sundays, Jesus is a compelling answer to the challenges of life that seem so unanswerable.

How do you get there? What is the final destination? Who doesn't have trepidation when approaching these questions or that finish line? Jesus may be a cross, and he may be a crutch, but whatever he is, he's there – larger than life, always a patina through which I can glimpse darkly at a more hopeful reality – a healing truth that is spirit.

My personal great commission is to try and get all of these ideas – my experience of it – out of my head and into words somehow. I'm not that effective at it in words, and do a little better in song. I have no vacuum cleaners to sell, unfortunately.