Intro: The following quote is from St. Gregory’s Sermon, text, St. Matthew 11: 2-10, for the 2nd Sunday in Advent. He shows that in our ‘small ways’ we too can be like John the Baptizer with the Message for a friend. The only stat I cite is that the majority of people who join a congregation do so because a family or friend invited them. Here is eloquent testimony and encouragement to do so, just as Philip said to Nathanael, “Come and see” (John 1:46)
You… who live in the Tabernacle of the Lord, that is, in the Holy Church, if you cannot fill up the goblets with the teachings of holy wisdom, as well then as you can, as far as the divine bounty has endowed you, give to your neighbors spoonfuls of the good word!
And when you consider that you have yourself made some little progress, draw others along with you; seek to make comrades on the road to God. Should one among you, Brethren, stroll out towards the forum or the baths, he will invite a friend whom he thinks is not busy to keep him company. This simple action of our ordinary life is pleasant to you, and if it be that you are going towards God, give a thought not to journey alone. Hence it is written: He that heareth, let him say: come (Apoc. xxii. 17); so let him who has heard in his heart the invitation of divine love, pass on to his neighbors around about him, the message of the invitation. And though a man may not have even bread wherewith to give an alms to the hungry; yet, what is still more precious is able to give who possess but tongue. For it is a greater to strengthen with the nourishment of a word that will feed the mind for ever, than to fill with earthly bread a stomach of perishable flesh.
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