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Our theme for Lent 2019 is Radical Conversion: From Me to Mission. We invite all of you to explore the missionary process, the six components of mission, and the various, and complementary, models of mission. We will see why Pope Francis has looked to mission as the key to the renovation of the Church in our world at this time in human history.
We will be posting daily Lenton reflections on our Lent webpage so join us as we prepare for the victory of Easter and the wonder of Pentecost.
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Updated on September 19, 2017
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Feature Article: Mission as Faith
Children often speak of the powerful example their parents set in shaping their view of service and opportunity. For Dick Horstman and his wife Judy, the roles were reversed, with the children teaching their parents how life-changing mission can be.
The Horstmans, who’ve lived in Houston for more than two decades, were always active in their faith—teaching CCD, volunteering in their parish—but it wasn’t until their three children began doing mission work that the couple realized lay people could serve the church and their sisters and brothers as missionaries.
Dick confesses that, growing up, “I thought, lay people don’t do mission,” he said. “Priests and sisters do mission!”
That early misconception makes it even sweeter that he is now the chair of the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston Mission Council, an entity that exists only in Texas and which has three focus areas: education, spirituality, and promotion of mission.
Fifteen years ago, Dick, at the time still an attorney for Marathon Oil, was attending a Catholic Relief Services conference in Houston. That might seem like a strange place for him to have been, but there he was.
“Oil companies are very interested in the developing world and in international business,” he said. “I personally was very interested in mission and the work CRS does.”
He happened to sit near then-Auxiliary Bishop Michael Rizzotto during a talk. The pair struck up a conversation, and before Dick knew it, he’d been appointed to the Mission Council.