This collage features the front covers of Worldwide issues over its 35 years of existence. At the centre is the cover of the first edition, dated October/November 1990. Worldwide saw the light during a missionary month and continues its mission of proclaiming the Gospel; this is the reason for its being.
Credit: Worldwide archives.
Fr Jude Burgers has a background in formation work, having spent ten years in that field in various institutions. His generous and glowing tribute as he refers to the journey of Worldwide Magazine and its existence is not only encouraging but inspiring.
WORLD REPORT • MEDIA EVANGELIZATION
WORLDWIDE: A MISSIONARY INSTRUMENT FOR THE KINGDOM
BY Fr Jude Burgers, MCCJ
I REMEMBER when Worldwide Magazine was first published in 1990. It sparked joy and marked a new beginning of reflection on the missionary Church in South Africa and the world. It has remained a steady witness ever since.
It is a tool for the evangelization of the mind. Opening new vistas, exposing different points of view, and leading towards building a new humanity. It has undergone many changes and survived many upheavals to arrive at its present form. It did this by learning to listen to its readership, responding to contemporary challenges, and offering hope to the marginalized and misunderstood.
Footsteps of St Daniel Comboni
Worldwide Magazine is a wholly South African venture and serves the Church in South Africa and also beyond its borders. The Comboni Missionaries, publishers of Worldwide Magazine, celebrated their centenary in South Africa last year. They follow in the footsteps of their Founder, St Daniel Comboni, by beholding the world through the eyes of faith and seeing God’s work. This experience is captured in all their magazines, including Worldwide. St Daniel Comboni said of himself:
The Catholic, who is used to judging things in a supernatural light, looked upon Africa not through the pitiable lens of human interest, but in the pure light of faith; there he saw an infinite multitude of brothers and sisters who belonged to the same family as himself with one common Father in heaven (WDC 2742).
Worldwide Magazine underlines the importance of our shared humanity, our interconnectedness, and our familyhood before God. In this, it echoes the opening lines of Vatican II’s Gaudium et Spes:
“the joys and hopes, the grief and anguish of the people of our time, especially of those who are poor or afflicted, are the joys and hopes, the grief and anguish of the followers of Christ as well. Nothing genuinely human fails to find an echo in their hearts” (Gaudium et Spes 1).
Synodal Church
Through the richness of its content, the voices of the readers, and its theological input, Worldwide Magazine works towards the building of a healthy and healed humanity. It offers a fresh perspective on the missionary activity of the Church in South Africa and the world. It reflects on the life of the Church in South Africa and on the global missionary Church. Its bimonthly appearance, centered around specific themes, offers ample scope for discussion, reflection, and all-around growth.
In step with our striving to build a synodal Church, Worldwide comes to our assistance through its simple yet comprehensive reporting on the Synod and its challenges, offering pointers towards its implementation. This process must not be allowed to be stalled; the synodal Church must grow and flourish in favour of the inclusion of all, especially the most marginalised.
In this Jubilee Year, when we are reminded that we are invited to be missionaries of hope, Worldwide Magazine remains standing as a beacon of hope in a fractious world. Despite the copious difficulties besetting South Africa, which caused the cessation of so many publications, Worldwide Magazine has continued. In good times and in bad, it has in the past thirty-five years weathered the storms that have witnessed epochal change in South Africa. It remains that Christian voice that enters the home, even if its receivers no longer walk with the Church.
Missionary Tool
Worldwide Magazine is a Christian missionary publication and has consistently featured Christian content, reflections on Christian life and practice, and direct biblical content. In this sense, it continues the very mission of Christ our Lord. The Mission Message for this year says:
While facing persecutions, tribulations and difficulties, as well as her own imperfections and failures due to the weakness of her members, the Church is constantly impelled by the love of Christ to persevere, in union with him, on her missionary journey and to hear, like him and with him, the plea of suffering humanity and, indeed, the groaning of every creature that awaits definitive redemption (WMD 1).
Worldwide Magazine offers a Christian perspective on contemporary social and political issues. This is beautifully portrayed in the regular features, excellently written and resourced, with direct bearing on the South African political scene, the Church, and the world. These articles are insightful and balanced and offer its readers the space to discern, discuss, and finally to shape their own responses to current situations. I am deeply touched by the depth and wisdom of these reflections. Political crises may make me feel helpless or angered at innocent suffering, yet I am profoundly moved by those living under these conditions and still offering hope and light to others. Conflict areas are to be found all over the world, where destruction, death, and famine rage. Through the Magazine, I become one with suffering humanity near and far. Together we stand before God united by the printed word and the Word made flesh.
edition on the 2025 Jubilee Year.
Credit: Worldwide.
Looking at past editions
The discerning and broad collection of contributors to Worldwide Magazine feeds the richness it offers in broadening our perspectives on different subjects and issues. Among these, I include the issue of women and mysticism, which, for some reason, stands out as one of the most thought-provoking issues. There have been many excellent editions of Worldwide Magazine, and I am truly grateful to all the journalists and contributors. Somehow, the magazine continues to inspire and form us along the path of becoming believers in a brighter future or missionaries of hope.
As I reflect on these past thirty-five years, I acknowledge my debt of gratitude to Worldwide Magazine for having helped me struggle through so many complex issues that face the Church and the world. The examples are legion. Our “best kept secret”, the social teaching of the Church, has been brazenly exposed, explained, and offered as a tool for transformation.
The renewed consciousness of the environment, global warming and its effects, and the need for us to care for our common home, are dealt with adequately and comprehensively. We are encouraged to care for creation in so many practical ways, including community gardens. The Magazine invites us to increasingly become more human.
Elements that affect our lives so deeply, and where we would need guidance to tread sensitively and with compassion, are broached with insight and care. For example, Worldwide helps us to understand the whole spectrum of mental health, its manifestations and impact, avenues of ministry, and growth in awareness of this phenomenon. The contributors to the Magazine raise our awareness to new levels and offer coping mechanisms as well as solid support for all of us affected by this condition.
Youth Platform
One of the most endearing elements of Worldwide Magazine is that it offers the youth a consistent platform. Articles on youth activity and young people in South Africa and various parts of the world feature as a staple. Some are set up as examples to follow, others are models of endurance and perseverance. Then there is the Vocation Page, offering young people examples and ways of dedicating their lives fully to the service of the Gospel. Young people are connected to each other, to socio-political situations, and artificial intelligence, and light is shed on a world that has become very confusing. Youth education features regularly, and this inspires hope and optimism in those concerned with youth care.
I congratulate the present leadership of Worldwide Magazine. Thank you, and happy thirty-fifth anniversary! To all our readers, happy anniversary!
References
- Pope Francis. January 25, 2025. Missionaries of Hope Among all Peoples. Message for World Mission Day 2025 (WMD). Dicastero per la Comunicazione – Libreria Editrice Vaticana, Vatican City.
- Pope Paul VI. December 7, 1965. Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et Spes. Dicastero per la Comunicazione. Libreria Editrice Vaticana, Vatican City.
- St Daniel Comboni. 2005. Writings (WDC). Comboni Missionaries. Sunningdale: UK.
A handicap for human dignity
Of the approximately five million refugees in Africa, spread across countries such as Uganda, Kenya and South Sudan, around 85 000 are undocumented. Meanwhile, globally, around 4 million people are considered stateless. These two conditions, being undocumented and being stateless, tend to be confusing, if not in the context of bureaucracy, at least in terms of discourse and reflection on the vulnerability that both situations imply.