Adult Faith Formation
On the Road to Emmaus, the disciples met Jesus and were transformed. They said, “Our hearts are burning within us!”
Why were their hearts burning? They were burning because in Jesus the disciples caught a glimpse into the heart of God and found their world made new. They saw for an instant the full scope of the Father's loving plan and its high point in Christ's death and resurrection. In that perspective, the pathway of their lives opened from confusion and despair into conviction and hope, and they began to grasp the height and depth of God's mysterious love. What a profound learning experience that must have been!
The passage offers us a model for our ministry and shows the need we all have for ongoing formation in faith. For in it we see two adult disciples who, encountering the risen Lord, grow stronger in love, knowledge, commitment, and zeal. As then, today, "Those who are already disciples of Jesus Christ . . . [need] to be constantly nourished by the word of God so that they may grow in their Christian life."6
Such lifelong formation is always needed and must be a priority in the Church's catechetical ministry; moreover, it must "be considered the chief form of catechesis. All the other forms, which are indeed always necessary, are in some way oriented to it.”
“Our Hearts Were Burning Within Us”, A Plan for Adult Formation, USCCB
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