Six ways to involve your pastor in your RCIA process

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3 thoughts on “Six ways to involve your pastor in your RCIA process”

  1. I sketch out a schedule/calendar of topics that I intend to cover over the year (ex: Communion of the Saints near All Saints Day, the role of Mary/the Rosary near the feast of the Immaculate Conception, an Introduction to Lent before Ash Wednesday, etc) and I invite the pastor to come and lead a particular session at some point during the year. Sometimes I’ll ask him to cover an area I know he is particularly strong in or invested in, and other times I’ll ask him “Can you come on date X, Y, or Z to discuss A, B, or C?” I tell him I will plan and facilitate the prayer and faith-sharing discussion and all he has to do is talk informally about the specific topic and have a Q and A period. My experience is that my pastors have responded well to these very particular and manageable requests.
    Also, I ask him near the beginning of the year if he can simply pop in to say hello, welcome everyone, and introduce himself during one of the first few meetings after I have established the structure for our meetings.

  2. Elizabeth Lilly

    Every pastor – and priest and deacon – is “on the team” because he is the homilist. I often remind the homilists of the catechumen whose lives are changed by the Word, proclaimed and broken open.

  3. Mary Brouillard

    We do a year round RCIA program and have for about 10 years now. Most of our attendees are candidates – either Catholics seeking Confirmation or, mostly, those baptized in another faith tradition seeking full communion. We meet for an hour and 45 minutes on Sunday morning, beginning with faith sharing and reflection on the Sunday Scriptures, then discussing a topic of faith that the candidates have done some reading on prior to the session. I try as often as possible to schedule the faith topics in our program materials (Journey of Faith) to coincide with the catechetical theme of the Mass readings — sometimes that works better than others. The tricky part is when a new person joins the group that has been meeting for awhile – how do we bring them along. Depending on their experience of Church that is sometimes not a great challenge (for instance if they have been attending Mass with their spouse for years) but sometimes it is more of a challenge. We are always open to suggestions on how to improve the way we bring the newcomers into the group and helping them come along in the process. Our current pastor would prefer a more academic year model but so far has gone with the year round model we have been doing.

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