Partners in grace

Father Tom Fallati

I recall a seminary professor remarking how the faculty pass the summer months conscious of the quiet of the seminary and looking forward to the return of seminarians in the fall. I understand now what he meant.

As the busyness of June fades into the quiet of summer, a parish thins out. Folks leave for travel, school vacation starts and familiar faces are less often seen. The campus ministries that I work with shut down as students return home for the summer.

I realized, amidst the beauty of this summer, that something was missing. It was the people I am accustomed to encountering in my ministry. I found myself looking forward to seeing familiar faces and the return to the busyness of everyday ministry. With the start of September, indeed, I have found that joy in seeing the parish and campus ministries come to life anew.

The Lord allowed me to experience that quiet to better appreciate how I am fulfilled in my encounters in ministry. My experience says something important about ministry, how it encompasses not only a serving of others, but also a receiving of gifts.

The partnership of ministry

We tend to associate the word “ministry” with leadership of some sort in the Church, and indeed ministry often encompasses giving direction to some work in the Church. Yet the word ministry finds its root in the word “minus.” To engage in ministry is to be a servant of Christ, carrying out his work of proclaiming the Gospel. John the Baptist captures the essence of ministry: “He must increase, I must decrease” (Jn. 3:30).

The role of ministry is one of service and “decreasing.” But the “decreasing” is one that opens us to the grace that the Lord offers through ministry. It is precisely through ministry that our faith can grow.

St. Paul gives voice to this experience. He laments that he has not been able to see the Romans as he wished, and he tells them, “I remember you constantly” (Rom. 1:9). While he ministers to them in proclaiming the Gospel, he realizes that he in turn is built up in his own faith. He tells them, “I long to see you ... that you and I may be mutually encouraged by one another’s faith” (Rom. 1:11).

The service of ministry is mutual, so that St. Paul refers to the Philippians as “partners with me in grace” (Phil. 1:7). As a priest, it is true that I bring to ministry what I have learned in my academic studies and my various experiences. Yet I also receive from those I encounter. I am consoled in being able to offer words of comfort or counsel. I am encouraged by the faith of those I encounter. I am humbled by their efforts to live the Christian life. I am grateful that in ministering to them, I am able to find fulfillment in the gifts that the Lord has given to me. And I am especially strengthened in helping others enter into ministry themselves.

Exploring ministry

As I move forward in this column, I will explore ministry in its different forms in the Church. In whatever shapes it takes, ministry always serves the mission that the Lord gave the Church: to make disciples of all nations (Mt. 28:19).

And at the heart of all ministry is the joy that the Lord offers through it. I can share with St. Paul, “I give thanks to my God through Jesus Christ for all of you” (Rom. 1:8).

Father Tom Fallati is parochial vicar at St. Kateri Tekakwitha parish in Schenectady.