QI was wondering if you could give some guidance about sacramental preparation for older children (baptized Catholic, but formally uncatechized) 3rd grade and above, since there is little consistency among parishes within our diocese.

In most cases, these children (primarily 3rd-6th grade) have had no formal catechesis and have not celebrated first confession or first communion. Some of the parishes integrate them into a regular religious education program and use a two-year process, which would include sacramental preparation in the second year (for first confession and first communion only and confirmation later, usually in the 8th grade).

Many parishes place them in an RCIA program with some sacramental preparation for first confession and first communion in the second year, but they are not confirmed.

Then, there are some parishes that place them in an RCIA program, and they do receive all sacraments at the Easter Vigil; there is a distinction made at the Vigil between the neophytes and candidates.

Any thoughts or suggestions on what the best direction to go might be?

AOh my, what a tangle! Unless you are a diocesan employee, I think you have to focus on what is right for your parish. It might be better if all the parishes in your diocese had a uniform policy, but that may not be a problem you can solve. So what’s at stake here?

Read the rest of this entry »

We don’t often think of the acolyte or server as a team member, but this minster’s role can be important in the smooth flow of the rites. Perhaps because most parishes have someone who schedules and trains servers, we don’t think it is our place as catechumenate leaders to step in.

Every parish has its own ways of deciding such things, of course. But in my experience, I’ve either been the person that scheduled the servers or I had a good relationship with the person that did. I always scheduled or asked for the best of the best when we were celebrating RCIA rituals.

These are the five characteristics I look for in top acolytes:
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The ideal sponsor is someone fully immersed in their Catholic faith, and it’s wonderful when you have sponsors like this. In my experience, however, sponsors are sometimes not much more catechized than the catechumens. When that is the case, the sponsor coordinator is really a sponsor to the sponsors.

If you find yourself working with under-catechized sponsors, consider these four points. Read the rest of this entry »

In your RCIA process, do your catechumens and baptized candidates know the difference between Eucharist and communion? Bishop William Murphy of Rockville Center recently released a pastoral letter in which he ended his diocese’s practice of celebrating communion services in place of weekday or Sunday Mass. His reason for doing so was, partly, because he thought the celebration of communion services caused people to misunderstand the difference between Eucharist and communion.

This is how he described the difference: Read the rest of this entry »

I love stories, especially stories about how people got started in ministry. And more especially about how people got started in catechumenate ministry. We are, after all, a pretty specialized group. Sure, if we all showed up at a convention, it would look like there were a lot of us. But next time you are in a social group outside of church people (not likely, I know; I have a rich fantasy life), tell someone you are a specialist in the RCIA. The puzzled look will confirm that we are definitely our own small group.

The chances that you and I would wind up here are, indeed, pretty small. Some might say miraculous. So what’s your story?

The Concord Pastor reminds us on this feast day about the implications of Pentecost. He cites Economic Justice for All, which bears reading for all of us who are trying to be faithful to RCIA 75:4:¹

After Jesus had appeared to them and when they received the gift of the Spirit (Acts 2:1-12), they became apostles of the good news to the ends of the earth. In the face of poverty and persecution they transformed human lives and formed communities which became signs of the power and presence of God. Sharing in this same resurrection faith, contemporary followers of Christ can face the struggles and challenges that await those who bring the gospel vision to bear on our complex economic and social world. (Economic Justice for All, no. 47, US Conference of Catholic Bishops)

This, I think, points out the clear distinction between a classroom model of faith formation in the RCIA and a mystagogical or apprenticeship model. Our task is not merely to teach the catechumens about the apostolic mission of the church. Our task is to form followers of Christ who will transform lives and create communities that challenge the structures of endemic poverty and persecution in the world.

Check out the Concord Pastor’s entire post by clicking here.

1. Since the church’s life is apostolic, catechumens should also learn how to work actively with others to spread the Gospel and build up the church by the witness of their lives and by professing their faith. RCIA 75.4 [↩]

QOur church has just added over 100 children (candidates), 9 to 17-years-old, into the RCIA program. I have not been able to find information on discerning these baptized children. I am fairly new to the team and am finding discernment of children, or rather more specifically trying to determine when and who is ready, very frustrating. I hope you can provide me with some pointers to help make this process easier.

AWow! That’s a lot of children, and quite an age range. I think your first step is to do a little sorting. Are any of these children approaching your parish on their own, or are their parents also in a process of reception? For those whose parents are also in the process, I would focus on discerning the readiness of the family and not focus exclusively on the children.

For those children that are closer to the 17-years-old end of the spectrum, you can treat their discernment as you would the discernment of an adult.

The basics of a discernment process can be found in paragraph 75 of the RCIA. The criteria there are meant for unbaptized adults, but they can be adapted to anyone, at any age. Briefly, you want to see growth in

1. the way the candidates hear the word of God and understand the tradition of the church
2. the way the candidates pray and worship
3. the way the candidates participate in and contribute to the parish community
4. the way the candidates care for the poor and for those who have never heard the Good News

For a more detailed discussion of discernment, check out these links:

• RCIA Discernment: What is it and how do you do it?
• Do you know the three Rs of RCIA discernment?
• RCIA Discernment: How do you know if they “know enough”?

There is lots more that could be said about discernment, and I’m going to open the discussion up for comments to see what other wisdom is out there.

Diana just created TeamRCIA’s essential reading list for catechumenate teams. It’s a work in progress, and there are more resources we want to list. But here’s a start.

What’s missing? What resources does your team depend on? Click on comments, and share your secret sauce with the rest of us.

Ever have one of those days? Ever have a string of them? Last week, I thought I should have just stayed in bed for most of it. I wish I’d have seen Mike St. Pierre’s post, 6 Ways to Rebound from a Tough Week, earlier. Here’s my favorite from the list:

Don’t give up by Wednesday. I find that if I can tough it out through Wednesday, my week is salvaged. This is a pivotal day so hang in there on hump day.

I’d add one more to Mike’s list. I saw it at the bottom of somebody’s e-mail, and I can’t remember to whom it was attributed:

Plan ahead. Noah didn’t start building after it was raining.

One of the complaints I sometimes hear from catechumenate teams is that the parish isn’t really the full expression of church that the catechumens-now-neophytes might have come to expect. It is one thing to catechize them fully and correctly about how word, worship, community, and service are fully realized in the Body of Christ as it gathers around the Table of the Lord. It is another thing to shove the new Christians out of the small-group nest and into the less-than-perfect, not-quite-open arms of our fellow parishioners.

The disconnect is not difficult for catechumenate team members to spot. We, for the most part, have taken seriously the church’s mandate for ongoing, lifelong faith formation. Sometimes our fellow parishioners and sometimes even parish staff members haven’t quite embraced that vision of church.

A vision of parish

What if you could get the whole parish to engage in the kind of ongoing faith formation that we shape the catechumens in? What if the entire parish were undergoing a lifelong conversion process that led to a full implementation of the ministries of word, worship, community, and service? What if our parishes were so committed to growing in faith that the neophytes could leave the catechumenate thinking, “This is exactly what I signed up for!”?

Well, I can’t promise that’s going to happen in your parish, but I can tell you the way to get there. Or rather, Bill Huebsch can. He’s written a book called Dreams and Visions: Pastoral Planning for Lifelong Faith Formation. The book is deceptively simple. It provides a blueprint for how to move from zero to a fully realized parish, actively involved in lifelong formation. Bill’s blueprint is ten easy-to-understand steps. Easy to understand, but perhaps not so easy to commit to. The first one is the doozy:

1. Decide to do this and commit yourself to the vision.

The pastor, senior staff members, and key volunteers have to be on board. Once that’s accomplished, the rest is going to be a piece of cake by comparison. Fortunately, Bill’s book provides lots of support, suggestions, ideas, and even meeting agendas. And he has an even deeper level of support on his Web site, PastoralPlanning.com.

If you want to hand off the neophytes to a parish that can help them continue to grow in their new faith, you have to check out these resources.