There was a time when neighbours knew each other’s names, when the young and the old alike had more than their families looking out for them. There was a time when our neighbourhoods were our closest communities.
No more. Neighbourhoods have become the place where nobody knows your name. As neighbours gradually became estranged, parishioners became strangers! Into this “neighbourhood crisis” the words of Jesus still ring true: second only to the command to love God is the command to “love your neighbour as yourself.”
It is in the neighbourhood that we meet men and women who are in need of our love and care. The Church promotes vibrant Neighbourhood Christian Communities (NCCs) to make the dream of vibrant parishes come true. Saint John Paul II said, “NCCs are the new way of being Church.”
Let us try to make our neighbourhoods into places where compassion and care are once again part of the culture, where good news is once again more than words, and where the love of God can be once again rooted and established.
“NCC allows us to grow closer as neighbours and nurture the bonds of the Christian community to build the church for the greater glory of God.”