OUR PROPHETIC MISSION: MAKE THE WORLD OF THE POOR LESS LIKE HELL AND MORE LIKE HEAVEN (Constitution 9)

Posted on October 31, 2025 by franksantucci

We are members of the prophetic Church. While recognizing our own need for conversion, we bear witness to God’s holiness and justice. We announce the liberating presence of Jesus Christ and the new world born in his resurrection.

(Constitution 9)

Father Jetté invites us to reflect:

Announcing the liberating presence of Christ means to recall the ever present and actual role of Christ in man’s liberation and the establishment of a better world, one that is more just, more welcoming to the poor, the sick, the unfortunate.

… there is also a world more according to the Gospel, one that is already possible here on earth, thanks to Christ’s action which continues in people’s hearts and through the ministry of the Church and which strives to establish more justice, trust and love among men and between the peoples of the earth.

The Kingdom comes and grows when the Word of God is proclaimed to people; it is like a seed that is cast into the ground and is meant to grow (Matthew 13:3-23). Article 9 summons us to play our part in the coming of this new world that is more according to the Gospel. 

(F. Jetté OMI, The Apostolic Man, Pages 101-102)

“To expect heaven on earth is an illusion, but to tolerate the existence of hell on earth is not Christian. We are called to work with the poor and to help them make their world less like hell and a little more like heaven.” James Cooke OMI

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One Response to OUR PROPHETIC MISSION: MAKE THE WORLD OF THE POOR LESS LIKE HELL AND MORE LIKE HEAVEN (Constitution 9)

  1. Eleanor Rabnett, Lay Oblate says:
    October 31, 2025 at 14:31

    “We announce the liberating presence of Jesus Christ and the new world born in his resurrection.” (C 9)

    Yesterday I went to confess my sins so as to get them from being trapped within me and dictating how I will live. As I left to return home I sensed something being loosened up within me that had been like chains around me.

    To announce the evil in our world today takes immense courage and daring which is what Eugene’s life has shown and shared with us. No wonder the people with whom he spoke heard the Word of God proclaimed and kept coming back for more.

    Today I have a sense that nothing is so painful that God cannot heal us. It might not look like that in today’s world; but as Jetté notes there is a world within that is according to the Gospel: it resides within our hearts at the center of our beings through ministry of the Church. I cannot help but think of how St. Eugene calls all of us with whom he shared his aim to rebuild the Church: not just in a way that will make God more present to us, but in a way that Christ’s Church is within each of us.

    I use Google to help me learn not just the history of a word, but also it’s living sense within today’s prophetic Church. This morning I have used the word prophetic when speaking of the Church not because I am better than any other, but because I recognize that particular quality from within.

    I have the freedom to choose how I live as a member of the Oblate Charismatic Family…

    Reply

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