We like numbers. In ministry and evangelization efforts, we want to see big numbers, or at least numbers that demonstrate that our hard work is paying off. The problem is, numbers are often an illusion and a temptation to pride. As we have seen through multiple studies, the numbers don’t reveal activated disciples. With 22% of Catholic Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z attending Mass, the numbers on the ground can be deceiving. This stat, for example, doesn’t reveal how many Mass-attending Catholics are living discipleship beyond the doors of the church. So, despite the neatness of numbers and percentages, they do not reveal the quality of what is happening within the Church.
People may be showing up to Mass or other events, but that does not mean that they have been fully evangelized. Many have been sacramentalized and are checking Mass off the Sunday to-do list—but the rest of the week, their lives are secular. Our culture would look very different if the numbers revealed the quality of our discipleship, which is far more important. To foster quality, we have to go deeper and re-align our expectations to those of Christ.
The Lord and the saints who sought to conform their lives to Him, did not start with large numbers. The Lord started with four fisherman who He invited to follow Him on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. He then built up to 12 Apostles, but He started with one person at a time. He did not begin His public ministry expecting the crowds to simply appear. He’s God—He could have made that happen—but that would be forced, and love cannot be forced.
I have served in ministry long enough to know that the numbers game is a very real propensity for us fallen human beings. I have played it, and it set me up for failure every single time. We want to see tangible results in our work, but the Lord doesn’t typically work the same way we do. He sees individual souls He wants to save while we are too busy waiting to only show up for crowds. His public ministry—and the example of the saints—reveals that by starting with a focus on each individual soul, the crowds will eventually be built up. Quality numbers of people will begin to grow. Renewal is a grassroots, ground-up endeavor. It is not a top-down programmatic process of our own making.
My husband and I have been meditating on this truth a lot. For the last few years, we both have been sent into places without crowds. He gets up early every Saturday morning to lead a men’s group at our long-time parish. One or two men show up. It isn’t even always the same men. He and I go into hospital rooms to pray with fallen-away Catholics in order to invite them back to the Lord, but we often don’t visibly see the fruit of those visits.
I started a Monday evening rosary on the campus where I am the Catholic Campus Ministry Coordinator. One to two students show up. I spend half an hour setting up a Mary statue, lighting candles, putting out rosaries and materials, as well as breviaries, so we can end with Night Prayer. I put in the effort and I pray, not for crowds, but for the one or two souls the Lord wants to reach at that given moment. I pray in the heart of the Church and campus for His lost sheep to return to Him. The one to two students who need that time with their Heavenly Mother in the dark silence of prayerful candlelight come each Monday.
From a purely numbers perspective, our ministries would look like failures, but that is not how Christ sees. The Lord is not asking us to produce crowds. That would be wonderful, but the calling is not dependent on numbers. I hope one day to see many students coming back to the Faith through the many prayers and sacrifices I make on their behalf, but if I spend my time focusing on my desire for crowds, then I will miss the people right in front of me. I will cast them aside because they don’t fit the numerical agenda I have created, which is not from God. The Lord produces crowds of people in accordance with His will and plan. He simply asks us to put in the prayer and effort in serving Him and the one or two people He sends to us at a time. Those one to two will begin to multiply in time.
How does the Lord love and search for souls? He tells us very clearly in Sacred Scripture:
The tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to listen to him, but the Pharisees and scribes began to complain, saying, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.” So to them he addressed this parable. “What man among you having a hundred sheep and losing one of them would not leave the ninety-nine in the desert and go after the lost one until he finds it? And when he does find it, he sets it on his shoulders with great joy and, upon his arrival home, he calls together his friends and neighbors and says to them, ‘Rejoice with me because I have found my lost sheep.’ I tell you, in just the same way there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous people who have no need of repentance. (Lk. 15:1-7)
In our fallen human way of seeing things, we often are hard-hearted like the Pharisees and scribes. Often it is because we see someone else’s sins as greater than our own, but there is also a tendency to focus on the ninety-nine sheep rather than the one who is lost. The Lord’s love is so immense and self-emptying that He will go to whatever lengths He has to in order to save the one. He proves this on the Cross. We, however, tend to view the one as a sign of failure, or worse, as unimportant.
In the supernatural realm, each individual soul has inestimable worth. At a recent Monday night rosary, the only other person present at start time was one discerning the Lay Order of Discalced Carmelites, who prays regularly for the campus ministry, sings in the on-campus Mass choir, and helps out with the students. I told her that I would continue to show up even if no students come. That’s what the saints did, and it is their example that I am turning to. I will stay and pray for them, even if I am alone. Why? The Lord wants to save souls. It is that simple. My job is to show up and pray. Shortly afterwards, one student arrived. The one the Lord and His Mother wanted to reach in that moment.
The Lord does not see our work through the lens of numbers. He sees the heart. He sees how much we are willing to love each individual person He places in our midst. There are lost souls who need us to seek them out and to be present to them. The ninety-nine will be able to take care of themselves while the lost are sought out. The Lord will work miracles and tremendous renewal when we have our spiritual priorities in order.
The crowds build up from each individual person who encounters the Lord. Our mission is to see the person in front of us at each moment. When we take our eyes off that person, we start to focus on the wrong things. May we keep our gaze fixed on the Lord and the lost sheep He wants to save.
Photo by Robinson Recalde on Unsplash
