An authentically Catholic movement must be based upon the Magisterial teaching of the Church.  For this reason this Mission Statement of the Diocese of Charleston Volunteers first presents its pastoral-theological foundation by briefly explaining the universal evangelizing mission of the Church and then presents itself as a particular part of this universal ministry.

1. The Universal Mission of the Church

“The entire mission of the Church is concentrated and manifested in evangelization” (CL, n.33). In fact, the Church, sent as the “universal sacrament of salvation (LG, n. 48; AG, n. 1), is the missionary people of God. Evangelization means proclaiming the Good News to every member of the human race. The Good News is first of all, the very Person of Jesus Messiah, who alone reveals the Father because he is “God the only Son, ever at the Father’s side” (Jn 1:18). The Good News is also the call to the holiness of eternal life by incorporation into Jesus Christ as a member of his Body, the Church. This is the call to become and act as a child of his Father in the likeness of Jesus, his Son.

Through evangelization, humanity finds the truth he needs to know: who is God, man and what is his destiny, what is life, why suffering and death. The temptation today is to reduce Christianity to merely human wisdom, to a merely horizontal dimension (cf. RM, n.8). However, Jesus answers our questions and is, at the same time, their answer in person: “I am the light of the world. No follower of mine shall ever walk in darkness… I am the truth” (Jn 8: 12; 14:6; 8). The Good News is the Word of truth that alone brings true freedom and peace to the soul and to the world. In her proclamation of the Good News about the love of God in Jesus Christ, the Church does not coerce human freedom: she stops before the sanctuary of conscience; she proposes, but imposes nothing (cf. RM, 39).

 The Good News is offered through the personal witness of a truly Christian life and by the clear and unambiguous proclamation of the Lord Jesus.  Since the Church is his Body, it must be included in this proclamation, together with the principle means of grace, the seven sacraments, which have been confided to the Church. The call to holiness is rooted in baptism and proposed anew in the other sacraments, principally in the Eucharist (cf. CL, n. 16). All our human activity is to find its purification in the Eucharistic Mystery so that we might bring about the universal brotherhood of mankind, a brotherhood that can only be accomplished through the Fatherhood of God in his Son.

 The proclamation of evangelization has Christian conversion as its aim; a complete and sincere adherence to Christ and his God through faith. Conversion means accepting, by a personal decision, the saving sovereignty of Christ and becoming his disciples. The Church calls all people to this conversion. 
 
2. The Diocesan Mission of the Volunteers

As Catholic lay faithful, the Volunteers - sharers by the Sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation in the threefold mission of the Lord Jesus, who is Priest, Prophet and King - are founded especially to provide lay missionaries and leaders of Eucharistic evangelization for the Church of Charleston. 

The Eucharist is their school of life and love. Since the Eucharist creates the New Covenant by making present the sacrificial action that reveals God to men as Father in Jesus, the Volunteers live in union with the Person and activity of Jesus in the Eucharist. 
 
Just as the salvific activity of Jesus in the Eucharist, so does the Volunteers’ evangelizing activity have the purpose of revealing the love of God the Father, manifested in Jesus Christ to all persons whom they serve. As faithful children of the Church, the Volunteers contribute to mankind’s pilgrimage of conversion to God’s plan through their witness, proclamation and their various activities. The Volunteers give witness by their Christian life and their various concrete forms of caring service that are the Church’s practical translation of the love of the Father for all mankind in his Son. 

The Church has an authentic “secular” dimension because her lay faithful receive their call from God in the secular world.  The secular world is the “place” of the Volunteers. However, while they are “in” the world, they are not “of” the world (Jn 17: 14-16).

The Eucharistic Covenant restores mankind’s universal brotherhood through its special relationship as God’s children in his Son. Since Jesus is the bond of communion with the Father, we live in God’s peace through Jesus Christ, our Brother. Thus the Volunteers are truly “Eucharistic Peacemakers” through their evangelizing work of bringing Jesus into the lives of others. This appellative is proper to the Volunteers since they live the beatitude: “Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called sons of God” (Mt. 5:9)

Since Mary is Mother of God and Mother of the Church, she is the “Star of Evangelization” (cf. EN, n. 82) that guides the Volunteers in their efforts to bring the peace of her Son to others. They beg her help, guidance and maternal protection as they go about their evangelizing work.

Abbreviations:

AG Decree on the Church’s Missionary Activity, Ad gentes, Vatican II, December 7, 1965
CL  Apostolic Exhortation, Christifideles laici, John Paul II, December 30, 1988
EN Apostolic Exhortation, Evangelium nuntiandi, Paul VI, December 8, 1975
LG  Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium, Vatican II, November 21, 1964
RM  Encyclical Letter, Redemptoris missio, John Paul II, December 7, 1990