Rachel Carson’s book, The Sea Around Us, describes the microscopic vegetable life of the sea which provides food for many of the ocean’s smallest creatures. She tells how these little plants drift thousands of miles wherever the currents carry them, with no power or will of their own to direct their own destiny.
The plants are named plankton, a Greek word that means “wandering” or “drifting.” Plankton describes the wandering plant life of the ocean. [Robert A. Raines, New Life in the Church (San Francisco: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1961).]
Plankton may also be a good way to define the life of the Church today. We are wandering, adrift. What is our mission as a Church? Why do we exist?
From my studies of Jesus’ ministry and teachings, I believe we exist for two reasons: one is to reach individual people with the Good News of God’s love as revealed in Jesus Christ; the second is to influence society to the point that the kingdoms of this earth more closely resemble the Kingdom of God.
Submitted by Fr. Joseph Dovari