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November 23, 2008
EWTN anchor calls laity to action
How do you change the culture? By changing hearts. That’s what Raymond Arroyo, host of the Eternal Word Television Network’s “World Over Live” told those in attendance at the annual Catholic Citizens of Illinois Annual Dinner Nov. 6 at Drury Lane in Oakbrook Terrace.
Arroyo encouraged the audience to learn from others who have influenced the culture such as Dean Martin (of whom Arroyo is a fan) and Pope John Paul II.
He said Martin used humor and self-deprecation to capture and move his audiences time and again. John Paul II, also a trained actor, understood that you can’t just verbally deliver a message like the Gospel for it to be effective, you have to live it.
Even in his dying John Paul II was teaching. He taught the world how to suffer and die with dignity, the anchor said.
“Young people saw what he did and they were moved by it and came to say good-bye [in Rome],” Arroyo said. “He knew that it is not enough to say the right thing. We have to do the right thing.”
Arroyo, whose latest book is “Mother Angelica’s Private and Pithy Lessons from the Scriptures,” (Doubleday, $17.95), is a trained actor himself and sprinkled his talk with impersonations of Mother Angelica and others, making many in attendance laugh.
He said it’s the Catholic laypeople who must rise to the challenge to evangelize the culture.
The best way to engage the culture is with a “supernatural excellence,” he said. Do it with joy and humor, he offered, along with: Embody the Gospel; Be the example of what we preach; Be willing to sacrifice and suffer; Reach every facet of the culture.
“We have the opportunity to change the world one soul at a time,” he said. “We as Catholics living our faith must be better than the competition.”
