Two Approaches to Ministry

I've had a lot of people ask me in the last month what I am doing for a job.

"I'm a missionary. I'm spreading the good news that we are all called to holiness, to sainthood, that if we allow to God to work in our lives He will transform it into something beyond our wildest dreams."

Yes, I am consulting with a parish privately and they are compensating me. I guess you could technically call that a "job." A part time job. My primary source of support is my speaking and writing.

One of the things that happened to me in the last year as I started to flesh out The Sainthood Project was a realization that my calling was bigger than one parish or one school. Certainly if I focused I could simply do that one ministry, but I kept getting called to spread myself out.

It wasn't that I didn't like being a high school teacher, a campus minister, a music minister, a diocesan coordinator, a writer, or a speaker. I felt called to all of those. It was that when I was totally honest with myself and others, I was not doing the best I could at any of them because any time I saw a need and someone offered the opportunity, I took it.

Take a look at your own life. How many ministries are you involved in? How many after-school activities? How many things are you planning to do with your own life? I think that you can either do one of two things.

1. Surrender your ego to doing one thing really well. When I focused on just being one thing, I was very effective because over time you are able to build up trust in what you are doing, that you are doing it with a legitimate calling in mind. St. Terese of Liseux did this. She wanted to become love. Period.
2. Do a single thing so well that you can repeat it in different areas. I've done talks around the country on Theology of the Body, Scripture, B 16's encyclicals, and youth ministry. Now I am trying to focus on living as a saint. Simply because I want that message to be so strong, so effective, that it has an impact in the short amount of time I have with people or a parish. St. Paul did this. He preached Jesus Christ in every place that he went, using his training and education.

We live in a world where there are a ton of pressures to do a ton of things and to spread ourselves out. If you feel called to do that, fine, pray about it and live it out. Just make sure that you are either doing one thing really well, or doing one thing in several different places and ways.