186 total views
On this Feast of your "Protokletos" or your "first to be called" as Apostle, I pray Lord Jesus, for the many other St. Andrew who have led me to you to be your disciple. How beautiful it is to recall from the fourth gospel how St. Andrew was originally a disciple of St. John the Baptist but when he met you on your baptism, he dared asked you where you stayed; and when you told him to "come and see", the next thing we are told he called his elder brother Simon, telling him how he had seen the Messiah and brought him to you.
My coming and seeing you, and following you, dear Jesus, happened through the men and women you have earlier called to be fishers of men to call me too with their kindness and witnessing to your gospel: my former teachers, the many priests who have inspired me with their ministry and friendships, the nuns who nurtured my vocation in elementary, the many other dedicated men and women of faith whose lives with their encouraging conversations and affirmations have inspired me to seek and follow you more, Lord.
Hence, on this day, I pray also for deeper faith, livelier hope and more infectious love from you, Lord Jesus, that I may also be like St. Andrew, a fisher of men and women who would bring people closer to you in the service of the Church and for the poor and needy.
But how can they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how can they believe in him of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone to preach? And how can people preach unless they are sent?
Romans 10:14-15
Here I am, Lord; send me! Amen.