The word Mission is widely spoken about.
However, people find it difficult to talk about mission in its religious and church context. They think it is archaic or it is an expression of intolerance.
The basic perspective of mission, for which we feel responsible, is that it concerns "Life in its fullness", which God himself wants to give to all people of this world and that God already works in this world, since its origin.
Mission is for us the participation in the salvific work of God and for that manner service for the kingdom of love, justice and peace, which Jesus preached about and for which He dedicated his whole life.
We take after the example of Jesus in his way of interaction with people, especially when we interact with people who do not belong to any religious confession, who are searching for faith or have lost their faith and have left the Church; people who are poor, oppressed or pushed to the outskirts of society; people who belong to different cultures and faith traditions or who are following secular ideologies. This understanding of mission underlines our life as missionaries of the Divine Word.
We are glad about the fact that young (women and men) temporary missionaries, work with us in this mission of God since 30 years. In order to optimally organise the involvement of these young missionaries (MaZ), we established a MaZ-centre in St. Augustine. This centre works closely with German-Speaking provinces (Switzerland, Austria) of the Divine Word Missionaries and other religious congregations.
We thank these young temporary missionaries (MaZ), who collaborate with us to give an answer to the missionary challenges of this one world.
Bernd Werle SVD