Charism, being Christ to Others
What is your greatest strength that you can offer? In interviews we are expected to be totally self-aware, but the fact is we are not. Sometimes we even believe falsehoods about ourselves, but it usually is not balanced either we way over do it or way underestimate. However, the truth is that we all were made for a mission, a calling, a vocation. Only we can accomplish that to which we are called. This mission and all it entails is the cross we carry. This mission progresses only through love, first receiving the Love of God letting boil over and spill into all other aspects of our life and relationships. Proper to that mission, we are gifted with certain perspective and ability. In following and giving forth the charisms that we are naturally given through our relationship with God.
Charism is the way in which a person encounters Christ most easily and where others encounter Christ through them. This is aspect in which they are crucified and in which to them the world is crucified. They are joined at once to the transfiguration and graces of the resurrection while still bearing the passion and death of Christ. Just as they participate in the graces the also give those graces forth, and Christ’s blessings are sent forth into the lives of others. In parents, it is stewardship of children and caring in every aspect possible for their spouse. For children it is obedience and care for their parents. For Carmelites, it is constant self-gift in prayer. For Dominicans it is study and preaching. For Franciscans, it is poverty and service. For Benedictines, it is work and prayer. For priests, it it serving the people of God, and being a sacramental vessel. For those not yet in a vocation above it is discernment and service for the sake of the kingdom. For each though, depending on our job, our personality, our familial needs, etc. We are gifted in kind and there is no one whose charism is exactly like ours and ours is not the same as anyone else’s.
In conclusion, our charism(s) is bestowed according to the need of the Church in the lives that we encounter and our nature and openness to it. It may very well be that we will be the only opportunity our neighbors have for encountering the love and blessings of Jesus Christ. Just as Jesus took on flesh to move behind enemy lines to work His sacrifice of salvation Himself, He hopes to do it vicariously through us. In no sacrament is this more apparent nor more fundamental than in the Eucharist when we receive Christ into our bodies that we may become Christ and sacrament ourselves. Would that through the living out of our mission in our charisms, we and the world be sanctified through the presence of Christ radiated forth in our lives. Would that Christ truly present in the Eucharist would be truly present i.e. made incarnate in us. Would that our sacrifices joined to Christ’s would also participate in the action accomplished therein as we “pick up for what is lacking in the cross” (Colossians 1:24). As I wrote this my mother sent me, Psalm 9:1, “I will give thanks to the Lord with my whole heart; I will tell of all your wonderful deeds”. Indeed, by living out our mission we do exactly this.
CCC 850: The origin and purpose of mission. The Lord's missionary mandate is ultimately grounded in the eternal love of the Most Holy Trinity: "The Church on earth is by her nature missionary since, according to the plan of the Father, she has as her origin the mission of the Son and the Holy Spirit." The ultimate purpose of mission is none other than to make men share in the communion between the Father and the Son in their Spirit of love.
Teresa of Calcutta: Love until it hurts
Eucharistic Prayer II: Fulfilling your will and gaining for you a holy people,
he stretched out his hands as he endured his Passion,
so as to break the bonds of death and manifest the resurrection.
