I recently found myself reflecting on the course of my summer. As a pilgrim of hope, I traveled to Rome to celebrate the Jubilee year, alongside parish directors of evangelization from the archdiocese. We were blessed and privileged to accompany Archbishop Robert Casey to the Papal Mass where Pope Leo XIV bestowed the pallium on him. Later, in the mountains of Tennessee, I visited a few days with my religious community and got much needed rest. It was a nice respite and renewal after a long work year. Finally, my thoughts drifted to all the young couples I accompanied this summer as they took their first steps into sacramental marriage and founding their newly constituted families. Indeed, a blessed summer.

It was at the most recent wedding I presided over that several interesting encounters with young people inspired me to write this article. Called over to the bridal party’s table at the rehearsal dinner, I was asked to address some questions. One bridesmaid asked how her baptized boyfriend could become Catholic. She and her boyfriend were pondering their relationship’s future and wondered what it would take to both belong to and get married in the Catholic Church. The impending wedding’s excitement and beauty had provoked all kinds of practical questions for how to take the next steps in their own personal journeys.

Several more couples approached me over the next two days with similar inquiries, not only about Catholic marriage but also about receiving the Eucharist and renewing their engagement with the Church. Many found themselves distant or at the initial stages of a spiritual journey, with loose or no connection to the institutional Church. Our current encounter was reawakening deep stirrings and questions about belonging to the Church and its relevance to their lives. I thought of the rich young man who approached Jesus with deep questions about his life, “What more do I need, what am I lacking?” Translated into modern terms: How do I find happiness? How do I belong? What does it take to build a fulfilling life? Jesus’ response was simple: “Come, follow Me.”

Although simple in theory, it is challenging in practice! I believe the more authentic question about belonging was less about how to belong than “to whom do I belong?” We currently find

ourselves in a new apostolic age. It is not enough to just lean on a process of sacramental participation and catechesis: we need to engage in deeper dialogue on what it means to follow Jesus and belong to His Church—His Mystical Body, His people, the family and community of faith.

Our conversations were initiated by questions about sacramental participation in the Church that led to discussions about sacramental realities. The sacraments are the door to participation in the Church’s life and the source of grace and union with Christ and His Church. The Eucharist is the source and summit of our Christian life: Jesus truly present. The sacraments are also the immediate preparation for eternal life, as I was reminded when I anointed my own father as he was leaving this life and going home to God.

But too often, we have used the sacraments as a crutch and leaned too heavily into the sacramental process as the participation and primary pathway of evangelization. In past generations, the Christian culture was strong enough to fill in the gaps. Today, the sacraments are just a beginning, a privileged place for nurturing a developing relationship with our God to whom they point and from whom they flow. They are also a goal and an end for life with God, through Jesus, in the Holy Spirit.

Encountering others, engaging them, walking with them as they journey, blessing them, initiating them into following the Lord, and answering their questions about God, their lives, and their purpose in the world—strengthening them with all the means that the Church offers—this is the way of discipleship and evangelization.

For me, this is the reason for Beacons of Light: to rediscover our original calling and renew our response to the Lord. ✣

Father Matthew Summe, LC, is the Managing Director of College & Young Adult Evangelization for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati.

This article appeared in the September 2025 edition of The Catholic Telegraph Magazine. For your complimentary subscription, click here.