Catechists As a Sign of Hope

Feature Address by Bishop Robert LLanos to the 2025 Diocesan Catechetical Gathering

September 25-29, 2025

My dear friends, welcome to our gathering of catechists for the Jubilee Year 2025. May our gathering be a joyful coming together of God’s faithful disciples who proclaim the Kingdom of God to others. As we gather in His Name may we come to an ever-greater knowledge of the Hope we have in Christ Jesus and the freedom that it brings to those who believe. As a people of God, this Jubilee Year is significant because it is a time of an immense outpouring of Grace upon the Church. Apart from the grace of the plenary indulgence which, as you know, frees us from the burden of temporal punishment for those sins that do not separate us from God, you are set free to receive other graces particular to your ministry as catechists. In other words, this is not only a time of conversion for you as a person but also as catechists. For these reasons it is a time of encountering Hope in its most profound sense.

The Jubilee Year is a special gift of grace, characterized by the forgiveness of sins and in particular by the indulgence given which is a full expression of the mercy of God. What is an indulgence?

An indulgence is a remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven, which the faithful Christian, who is duly disposed gains under certain prescribed conditions through the action of the Church. An indulgence is partial or plenary accordingly as it removes either part or all of the temporal punishment due to sin. Indulgences may be applied to the living or the dead.

During the Jubilee year those who are moved by a spirit of charity and who, during the Holy Year, purified through the sacrament of penance and refreshed by Holy Communion, pray for the intentions of the Supreme Pontiff, will be able to obtain from the treasury of the church a plenary indulgence, with remission and forgiveness of all their sins, which can be applied in suffrage to the souls in purgatory.

This granting of a plenary indulgence extends to those who having satisfied the above requirements also engage in various acts of charity like the corporal and spiritual works of mercy. To receive these plenary indulgences, one may also do pilgrimages, visit sacred places, do works of penance, give alms to the poor and so on.

But the question remains, “What do we mean by the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven?” It is important to understand that sin has a double consequence.

Grave sin deprives us of communion with God (eternal punishment) and, venial and grave sin, entails an unhealthy attachment to creatures and things which must be purified in us either here on earth or in purgatory. A conversion which proceeds from a fervent charity (love) can attain the complete purification of the sinner in such a way that no punishment would remain (Council of Trent 1551).

What we call temporal punishment is the purification required for healing from the effects of our sins.

SEE APPENDIX 1

What is this Hope about which we speak in the Jubilee Year and where does it come from?

1817 Hope is the theological virtue by which we desire the kingdom of heaven and eternal life as our happiness, placing our trust in Christ’s promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit. “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful.” (Heb 10:23) “The Holy Spirit . . . he poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that we might be justified by his grace and become heirs in hope of eternal life.” (Titus 3:6-7)

1818 The virtue of hope responds to the aspiration to happiness which God has placed in the heart of every man; it takes up the hopes that inspire men’s activities and purifies them so as to order them to the Kingdom of heaven; it keeps man from discouragement; it sustains him during times of abandonment; it opens up his heart in expectation of eternal beatitude. Buoyed up by hope, he is preserved from selfishness and led to the happiness that flows from charity.

 Through the merits of Jesus Christ and of his Passion, God keeps us in the “hope that does not disappoint.”                               (Rom 5:5) Hope is the “sure and steadfast anchor of the soul . . . that enters . . . where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf.” (Heb 6:19-20) Hope is also a weapon that protects us in the struggle of salvation: “Let us . . . put on the breastplate of faith and charity, and for a helmet the hope of salvation.”           (I Thess 5:8) It affords us joy even under trial: “Rejoice in your hope, be patient in tribulation.” (Rom 12:12) Hope is expressed and nourished in prayer, especially in the Our Father, the summary of everything that hope leads us to desire.

1821 We can therefore hope in the glory of heaven promised by God to those who love him and do his will. (Mt 7:21) In every circumstance, each one of us should hope, with the grace of God, to persevere “to the end”  (Mt 10:22) and to obtain the joy of heaven, as God’s eternal reward for the good works accomplished with the grace of Christ. In hope, the Church prays for “all men to be saved.” (1Tim 2:4) She longs to be united with Christ, her Bridegroom, in the glory of heaven.

2090 When God reveals Himself and calls him, man cannot fully respond to the divine love by his own powers. He must hope that God will give him the capacity to love Him in return and to act in conformity with the commandments of charity. Hope is the confident expectation of divine blessing and the beatific vision of God; it is also the fear of offending God’s love and of incurring punishment.

My dear friends, we encounter Hope through personal and communal prayer. 2657 Thus, the Holy Spirit, who instructs us to celebrate the liturgy in expectation of Christ’s return, teaches us – to pray in hope. Conversely, the prayer of the Church and personal prayer nourish hope in us. The psalms especially, with their concrete and varied language, teach us to fix our hope in God: “I waited patiently for the LORD; he inclined to me and heard my cry.” (Ps 40:2) As St. Paul prayed: “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may abound in hope.” (Rom 15:13)

2658 “Hope does not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” (Rom 5:5) Prayer, formed by the liturgical life, draws everything into the love by which we are loved in Christ and which enables us to respond to him by loving as he has loved us. Love is the source of prayer; whoever draws from it reaches the summit of prayer.

At this juncture we may summarize our treatise on Hope in the following statements:

• Hope is our desiring the Kingdom of Heaven and eternal life as our true happiness through intimate communion with God by the grace of the Holy Spirit.
• God has placed this desire in the heart of every human being because we are made by Love for Love.

• Because of the merits of Jesus Christ and of his Passion, God keeps us in the “hope that does not disappoint”. The fulfilment of what we hope for is guaranteed in Christ Jesus for those who love him and do his will (Mt. 7:21)

• Hope is the confident expectation of divine blessing and the beatific vision of God.

• Hope is expressed and nourished in prayer, especially in the ‘Our Father’, the summary of everything that hope leads us to desire. The ‘Our Father’ is the prayer of Hope par excellence.

• Hope is encountered through personal and communal prayer. The prayer of the Church and personal prayer nourish hope in us. Prayer, formed by the liturgical life, draws everything into the love by which we are loved in Christ Jesus, and which enables us to love as he has loved us. Love is the source of prayer and prayer nourishes our hope.

• If our hope is salvation through holiness of life, then the Jubilee Year brings us closer to it because it brings conversion and healing through the purification of our souls.

My dear friends, we will conclude this opening presentation by asking, “Where and when do we encounter hope?” and “How is the Catechist a sign of Hope      ?” I would like to propose that we encounter Hope when we pray individually and together as the body of Christ in the liturgy of the Church and its Sacraments; when we read and pray the word of God; when we engage in acts of profound charity and love through sacrifice; when we forgive and are forgiven; when we care for and treat with the most marginalized, rejected and least considered members of our communities. We encounter hope when we reverence and are open to others even in their imperfections and brokenness. In conclusion, Hope is everywhere where a Catholic Christian is.

Finally, Catechists are a sign of Hope when they teach the faith to others from hearts filled with conviction that comes from their own personal journey of conversion and healing. They are a sign of hope when the reason for their ministry as Catechists is a genuine love for God and those they teach, and which is always open to purification and perfecting.

They are a sign of Hope when their ministry causes them to increase their knowledge and understanding of the faith so that they can be the best Catechists (new wine, new wine skins). Finally, they are a sign of hope when, in communion and friendship, they are men and women of deep prayer and the Sacraments.

Finally, as we pray, retreat and fellowship with one another over these four days, may we encounter hope in each other and the missionary spirit of discipleship, which will strengthen and renew us, as we go forward and proclaim the good news. Let us take seriously the opportunity given to us in this Jubilee moment to attend to prayer and Sacraments (especially Confession) that we may partake of the Church’s spiritual treasures and come to life in Christ.