Archive for the ‘Evangelization’ Category

I am the proud owner of a series of four catechumenate books in Swahili. They were given to me by a religious Sister from Congo who attended a workshop I gave a couple of years ago in the Bronx. My Swahili is basically non-existent, yet I love these books. Part of what attracts me are [...]

In a previous post, I said that reevangelization might be easier for us than evangelization because when we are evangelizing, we have to spend more time and energy talking about why we believe in Jesus as opposed to what we believe about Jesus. We have to say more about how Jesus answers our deepest longings [...]

In a previous post, I laid out a challenge for well-established RCIA teams to look at what it is they are spending most of their time and energy on. I suggested that if they are not already doing so, they should shift their efforts to be primarily focused on evangelization and conversion. Good news: a [...]

I have a challenge for you and your team—especially if you have been together for a while and have mastered the basics. (If you are a new or reconstituting team, you can find some help with the basics here.) My challenge is for your and your team to take a next step in your efforts [...]

Most initiation ministers don’t think of the greeters for Sunday liturgy as being on the RCIA team. Perhaps we should. Let me tell you about my experience as an inquirer this summer. Because of my travel schedule, I was in a different parish almost every Sunday in July and August. No one said hello to [...]

A blog post at Whispers in the Loggia drew my attention to Cardinal Peter Turkson of Ghana. I had never heard of him, but I’m glad now that I have. Turkson is Ghana’s first cardinal and was the spokesman for October’s Synod of Bishops for Africa. He may soon be heading up the Vatican congregation [...]

Kent Schaffer, on the Church Relevance blog, has posted the top 13 reasons seekers choose a church. The top three are: preaching teaching hospitality This would be a great discussion to have with your team. As you are making plans to start or improve your catechumenate process, how can you make the seekers’ top three [...]

The Concord Pastor wondered aloud the the other day about what requirements for membership we might list in our parish bulletins. He had run across a Unitarian Web site that got him wondering: I Googled the church and in perusing their website I came across the following with regards to membership in their parish: Becoming [...]

People keep usurping the word evangelization, and therefore make it more difficult for us to accomplish the primary mission of the RCIA—go and baptize. First it was the evangelicals, who used the word to identify a denomination of Christianity quite distinct from Catholicism. On the face of it, there’s nothing wrong with a denomination defining [...]

At the Forum Convocation last November, keynote speaker Richard Gaillardetz noted that the New Testament was written in Greek. That is significant, he said, because it means the New Testament was not written in Aramaic, the language of Jesus. (I think he was quoting, but I can’t make out my notes clearly.) I had never [...]