Your Everyday Life Is Your Apostolate
Apostolate begins with being sent.
“As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” — John 20:21
God is already at work, and the baptised are invited into that work. We have a place within it. We have responsibilities within it.
Our work as Christians is broader than employment. It includes family, society, culture, politics, economics, education, service and creation.
When the Church teaches that the proper field of the laity is the temporal order, this means that, for the doctor, exercising her apostolate does not primarily mean leading a Bible study in the hospital, organising a prayer group, or putting religious posters on the wall. It means treating patients with dignity, exercising sound judgement and duty of care, refusing corruption, serving the vulnerable, bringing truth and charity into medical practice, and allowing her Christian values to shape how she practises medicine.
Likewise, the lawyer’s apostolate is defending justice, protecting the innocent, resisting dishonesty, and helping build a legal order that serves the common good.
The lawyer exercises her apostolate through being the kind of lawyer God would want her to be.
The doctor exercises her apostolate through being the kind of doctor God would want her to be.
The mother exercises her apostolate through being the kind of mother God would want her to be.
The teacher exercises her apostolate through being the kind of teacher God would want her to be.
The politician exercises her apostolate through being the kind of politician God would want her to be.
The shopkeeper, business owner, farmer, worker, employer, artist, student, professional, volunteer or citizen exercises her apostolate by doing her work intentionally as participation in God’s action through the ordinary responsibilities and realities of life: to help build a world where true justice, lasting peace and selfless love prevail.
It begins with recalibrating our mindset towards Christ and wilfully turning our everyday tasks into acts of worship. Even our civic responsibilities can become a way of exercising our apostolate when we consciously make them so.
Whatever you do, make it count towards the Church’s mission in the world.
