Catholic Christian Outreach brings the message of the Gospel to young people

OTTAWA (CCN)



Catholic Christian Outreach (CCO) missionaries not only share the gospel with university students, they invite them to respond to Jesus Christ. Thousands have.

At the Founder’s Dinner, an annual fundraiser in Ottawa, CCO co-founder Andre Regnier told 250 friends and supporters of the movement that CCO missionaries “know it is a challenge” to bring the message of Christ to university students, but they are called to be “a light to the nations” (Isaiah 49:6) and to hone their message “like a polished arrow.” (Isaiah 49.2)

The missionaries “want to bring the message of the Gospel to young people, so they can experience conversion and be part of the Church,” said Regnier.

CCO is not restricting its message to those who are easy to reach, but going to the “people on the periphery” on campus, he said. “They spend time on the periphery to make their message a polished arrow.”

Though in those conversations they talk about the bad decisions we have all made, how we are selfish, how everyone is insecure and has these deep sins, in talking about sin, about something very private, the missionaries make it “a talk of freedom,” that is inspiring, creative and energizing, he said.

The aim is “so people will know Jesus is God,” and not just a “prophet or a teacher,” he said.

Even Catholics on campus “have a huge issue with the divinity of Christ,” he said. He spoke of a girl who had taken a faith study who was unable to agree with the truth that Jesus is God. She could not go forward unless she was able to “submit to the reality Jesus is God.”

“At the heart of our faith is the incarnation-God with us,” he said.

It’s a privilege to present the message that Jesus is Savior, that “His death and resurrection saved our very souls,” Regnier said.

Passionate, engaging conversations about the Gospel, the kerygma, take place in places like the coffee shop at Carleton University, he said. While the missionaries feel privileged to share the message they know people who hear the message must be invited to respond to it, “to respond to Christ’s invitation in their lives.”

CCO uses three images, using a drawing of a human being and the placement of a symbol such as a cross signifying God, to illustrate one’s relationship with Him. God is either outside of one’s life, and missing from the frame; in the frame, to represent that God is part of one’s life; or at the centre of the frame with the person, to represent “God is at the centre of my life.”

Most people will point to the second image, and say, “God is just part of my life,” he said. “It’s a beautiful realization and a wonderful place to start,” Regnier said.

“It’s inviting them to go inside to discover their desires, to ask themselves, ‘Do I desire Christ to be the centre of my life or let him be part of my life,” he said.

After some reflection, thousands of students across the country have responded to the third image and prayed to ask Jesus to be at the centre of their life, making a “profound life changing decision,” he said.

Jaiden Doyle, a third year journalism student at Carleton University said she had attended a Catholic school growing up, her family did not practice the faith. Her babysitter took her to Catholic Mass occasionally. When that stopped, she had a desire to continue. “I knew there was a God, but I didn’t know how to find Him.”

But upon entering university, she became concerned with making new friends, getting good grades and eventually making money. “But I didn’t have anything that made me internally happy,” she said.

In her second year, her sorority had a table next to a CCO display and she and a missionary struck up a conversation. Doyle said she was “so happy to have someone to talk about faith with me.”

The missionary invited her to attend the CCO Summit, an evening of Adoration and worship. “It was my first opportunity in six years to be in church,” Doyle said. “I felt I wanted a do-over, to create a brand new relationship with Christ that was not full of excuses.”

She said she “cried and cried” because she felt “so, so sorry I had abandoned God for all those years.”

Now that her life has been transformed, she said she has amazing conversations all the time with everyday people. “I want to share the love He gives me on a daily basis with everyone else.”

“I’m not afraid,” she said. “I can go to Him for everything. He is my best friend and I want everyone else to encounter Him as well.”

Lukas Marshy, part of the student leadership team, said he grew up in a family with a Protestant mother and a Catholic father that said grace at meals and attended church at Christmas and Easter.

“I only went to God when I needed help,” he said. When he arrived at Carleton University, he found himself “bombarded with questions” about his faith, so he decided to take a CCO faith study.

He, too, was invited to the Summit. “They talked about God as if they knew Him personally,” he said. “How could someone know God and have this kind of relationship? I realized they had something I was looking for-a life of purpose, not just living, but living for something.”

Accepting that Jesus died on the cross for his sins, “profoundly changed my life.”

“I finally had purpose and answer to the big questions,” he said. At the end of the faith study, he chose to “put Christ at the centre of my life.”

He was able to turn way from his “habitual sins and impure relationships.”

“I don’t have a void in my life,” he said.