Pastoral Associate for Evangelization

The Office of Evangelization of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas is seeking a full time Pastoral Associate for Evangelization to assist the Director of Evangelization in promoting the New Evangelization and provide administrative support to the Director of Evangelization.  The position requires exceptional organization and communication skills.  Responsibilities include office administration and correspondence, hospitality, event planning, managing websites and coordinating New Media.  A degree in Theology or a related field is preferred. Minimum two years administrative experience, experience in a religious education/evangelization setting strongly preferred.  Experience in a customer service environment preferred.  Must be a practicing Catholic in full communion with the Church, be faithful to the Church’s Magisterium and have a deep love of Jesus Christ, the Catholic Church, and the New Evangelization. 

Applicants are required to submit the following:  a cover letter addressing why you want to work for the Church; resume; application; and letter of support from your pastor. Please mail to:  Kathleen Thomas, Director of Human Resources, Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas, Evangelization Search, 12615 Parallel Parkway, Kansas City, KS  66109; or submit by email to jobs@archkck.org .  Submission deadline: October 11.

More information, including the ArchKCK application form, can be found here.

Full job description can be found here.

What a joy to contribute to EVANGELIZED KANSAS!

John and Theresa Smith and Family

I am Theresa Smith - wife of John for 30 years; mother of Jenny, Diana and Andrew for 28 years; Godmother of Patrick, Jacob and Cailyn for 2 years; and Director of Adult Faith Formation for St. Patrick Parish in Kansas City, Kansas for 13 years.

Evangelization is a natural part of marriage and family life. We begin marriage prep, marry in the Church, baptize our babies and become their missionaries teaching them about the Lord. We take them to Mass every week. We pray at meals, pray for healing, pray for forgiveness and even pray for a miracle or two.

Evangelization is a natural part of my work in the parish. We talk to those curious about the Church. We meet with couples preparing for marriage and teach about the sacrament and the domestic church. We visit with first time parents about baptism and the need to grow in our faith. We answer questions about the faith from parishioners.

Those are a lot of opportunities to evangelize.

So why did it take me so long to realize that the person who needed evangelization the most was me?

I grew up in a Catholic family that more or less went to Church every Sunday. I went to Catholic schools. I went to Mass more or less faithfully as a young adult. I married in the Church. I took the kids for their sacraments and sent them to Catholic schools. I had great ideas about what family members and parishioners needed to do to be better Catholics. I prayed regularly for their hearts to change and be more open to God’s will. I was vocal about what was wrong with everyone and gave a little bit of myself here and there.

Good start, right?

Wrong.

I loved the faith on my terms when it was convenient and made me feel good.

I learned the faith minimally and neglected studying my faith until my babies proved to me how little I knew. My tiny children asked me questions about the Mass and God and I was stunned that I couldn’t answer them.

I lived the faith based on what was comfortable and felt good to me.

Love It; Learn It; and Live It – This is not just a one-time slogan. Over the years, I have been evangelized by the witness of others, reflections of holy priests and popes, Catholic radio and television, awesome Catholic books, our beautiful sacraments and even a tragedy or two.

I was missing out on so much!

Thanks be to God for the generous evangelization efforts that have touched and changed my life. May the Lord use EVANGELIZED KANSAS to bring His Truth to others and help them to love it, learn it and live it.

To Him be the glory now and forever!

Thank You Kansas

Hi Evangelized Kansas!  I am so excited to learn from you.

My name is Olivia Stear. This is my husband Zeke and me.  Zeke goes to the University of Kansas, where we live in Lawrence with our two boys.  We are from a small suburb between LA and Palm Springs called Redlands, California.

My personality, gifts, talents and mission are best described by three facts:

1.  My father sells insurance

2.  My mother sells real estate

3.  And my grandmother was a protestant tent revival evangelist.

How I was Evangelized

My grandmother taught me to pray at the age of 6… after I asked her how to pray.  She said “talk to Jesus like you talk to me.”  And I did.

Then I turned 14 and asked God, “take me to your church!”  And He did.  I received my first communion and confirmation when I turned 16.

Sr. Ignatius befriended me at the University of San Francisco, and thereby re-evangelized me after I got seriously lost in the big city.  She also introduced me to FOCUS, the Fellowship of Catholic University Students.  At the FOCUS conference I encountered Jesus Christ in confession in a whole new way. 

FOCUS taught me so much.  And I was a missionary for 7 years and retired.  

How I was Evangelized by Kansas

When I found you, Kansas, I thought my testimony was over.  I thought my mission was over.  I wanted to sink into your cozy Catholic Jacuzzi, but you wouldn’t let me.  First, you picked me up when I was struggling in married life.  You encouraged me and empowered me and supported me to be the best wife and mother I could be.  Then, you inspired me to give back.  You taught me that an adult faith is one where you are fed, when you feed others.  You taught me to stop thinking of myself and start serving.  That God wasn’t done with me yet. 

The Experiment

Kansas, thank you so much.  My gift back to you is to share with you my little mission.  As a FOCUS Parish Researcher, I am a little Guinea Pig.  I am taking all my FOCUS experience and applying it to my life as wife, mother, friend and parishioner.  It’s a journey.  I hope I can share with you my best and worst practices.  I hope I can continue to learn more from you.

Olivia

Heal Wounds and Warm Hearts

Photo by Michele Gress

As I read the recent interview with Pope Francis, the following lines stood out as especially relevant for evangelization.  Each passage comments on the nature of the Church and her role in the world:

Small Chapel vs. Fruitful Mother

“This church with which we should be thinking is the home of all, not a small chapel that can hold only a small group of selected people. We must not reduce the bosom of the universal church to a nest protecting our mediocrity. And the church is Mother; the church is fruitful. It must be. You see, when I perceive negative behavior in ministers of the church or in consecrated men or women, the first thing that comes to mind is: ‘Here’s an unfruitful bachelor’ or ‘Here’s a spinster.’ They are neither fathers nor mothers, in the sense that they have not been able to  give spiritual life.”

Field Hospital for Wounded

“I see clearly,” the pope continues, “that the thing the church needs most today is the ability to heal wounds and to warm the hearts of the faithful; it needs nearness, proximity. I see the church as a field hospital after battle. It is useless to ask a seriously injured person if he has high cholesterol and about the level of his blood sugars! You have to heal his wounds.  Then we can talk about everything else. Heal the wounds, heal the wounds.... And you have to start from the ground up.”

Audacity and Courage

“Instead of being just a church that welcomes and receives by keeping the doors open, let us try also to be a church that finds new roads, that is able to step outside itself and go to those who do not attend Mass, to those who have quit or are indifferent. The ones who quit sometimes do it for reasons that, if properly understood and assessed, can lead to a return. But that takes audacity and courage.”

Missionary Style

“Proclamation in a missionary style focuses on the essentials, on the necessary things: this is also what fascinates and attracts more, what makes the heart burn, as it did for the disciples at Emmaus.”

Jesus: Heart of the Gospel Message

"The message of the Gospel, therefore, is not to be reduced to some aspects that, although relevant, on their own do not show the heart of the message of Jesus Christ."

 Laboratory vs. Frontier

“There is always the lurking danger of living in a laboratory. Ours is not a ‘lab faith,’ but a ‘journey faith,’ a historical faith. God has revealed himself as history, not as a compendium of abstract truths. I am afraid of laboratories because in the laboratory you take the problems and then you bring them home to tame them, to paint them, out of their context. You cannot bring home the frontier, but you have to live on the border and be audacious.

When it comes to social issues, it is one thing to have a meeting to study the problem of drugs in a slum neighbourhood and quite another thing to go there, live there and understand the problem from the inside and study it. There is a brilliant letter by Father Arrupe to the Centres for Social Research and Action on poverty, in which he says clearly that one cannot speak of poverty if one does not experience poverty, with a direct connection to the places in which there is poverty.”

The Key to Understanding Pope Francis' Pastoral Approach

“Love It, Learn It, Live It.”

 That’s the slogan Archbishop Joseph Naumann chose for the Faith Initiative for the Year for Faith here in the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas. I was initially surprised by the ordering, since it seemed to me that it would be more logical to put “Learn it” first.

 Apparently, I wasn’t alone: one of the priests addressed this question during Mass. He did so by asking one of the altar servers a series of questions: name, favorite color, and so on. What we received was a bunch of information. But, he pointed out, most of us didn’t know this server, so we would quickly forget everything we’d learned (and sure enough, I can’t even remember if the server was a boy or a girl).

He then contrasted this with the relationship of spouses: they’re in love with each other, so they joyfully want to know more about each other. You want to know the minutiae about the person you love: that desire to know him/her well is part of the nature of love. And so it is with God. If we love Him, we’ll desire catechesis, we’ll want to know more. If we don’t, these teachings will seem like a bunch of “rules,” or a political party’s public policy positions (say that three times fast).

 That’s what came to mind while I was reading Pope Francis’ interview with Antonio Spadaro, S.J.. I would suggest that the critical passage to understanding both this interview, and Pope Francis' papal style more broadly, is right here:

“The church’s pastoral ministry cannot be obsessed with the transmission of a disjointed multitude of doctrines to be imposed insistently. Proclamation in a missionary style focuses on the essentials, on the necessary things: this is also what fascinates and attracts more, what makes the heart burn, as it did for the disciples at Emmaus. We have to find a new balance; otherwise even the moral edifice of the church is likely to fall like a house of cards, losing the freshness and fragrance of the Gospel. The proposal of the Gospel must be more simple, profound, radiant. It is from this proposition that the moral consequences then flow. 

“I say this also thinking about the preaching and content of our preaching. A beautiful homily, a genuine sermon must begin with the first proclamation, with the proclamation of salvation. There is nothing more solid, deep and sure than this proclamation. Then you have to do catechesis. Then you can draw even a moral consequence. But the proclamation of the saving love of God comes before moral and religious imperatives. Today sometimes it seems that the opposite order is prevailing. The homily is the touchstone to measure the pastor’s proximity and ability to meet his people, because those who preach must recognise the heart of their community and must be able to see where the desire for God is lively and ardent. The message of the Gospel, therefore, is not to be reduced to some aspects that, although relevant, on their own do not show the heart of the message of Jesus Christ.”

This stands is sharp contrast from the media spin. For example, the Associated Press story claimed:

U.S. bishops were also behind Benedict's crackdown on American nuns, who were accused of letting doctrine take a backseat to their social justice work caring for the poor — precisely the priority that Francis is endorsing.

But that’s just patently false. Francis isn’t saying that moral issues favored by Republicans need to take a backseat to moral issues favored by Democrats. That’s a complete misreading, and suggests that the media obssession with viewing everything through the lens of politics obstructs their ability to grasp this. What Francis is saying instead is that all moral issues (even ones involving life and death) properly flow from a relationship with Christ. Morality that doesn’t flow from, or towards, Jesus Christ is simply incoherent.

(Originally posted at Shameless Popery)

Evangelize Kansas Now!

Father Andrew Strobl asked me to write a profile post to get started. Not only is this my first post for Evangelized Kansas, this is my first blog post ever!   I am very grateful for Father Strobl’s invitation because I have a great heart for evangelization.  

I am a priest of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas, ordained in 1995, and have served in a great variety of parishes and ministries. As a young priest I served as chaplain at Bishop Miege and Bishop Ward High School (Go Stags and Cyclones).  I have served as parochial vicar at Saint Ann in Prairie Village and at the Cathedral, pastor of Sacred Heart in Ottawa, pastor of Saint Ann in Prairie Village and for the last seven years have been blessed to be the Director of the Saint Lawrence Catholic Campus Center at the University of Kansas.  Along the way, I found time to pick up a Licentiate and Doctorate in Moral Theology from the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas in Rome (Angelicum).  I grew up in Shawnee, attended St Joseph Grade School, Aquinas High School and graduated from the University of Kansas in 1988.

I would use two Latin words to describe myself, “vir ecclesiasticus,” a “man of the Church.”  This description, attributed to Henri de Lubac, is explained this way, “Such a person will have fallen in love with the beauty of the House of God the Church will have stolen his heart.  She is his spiritual native country, his ‘mother and his brethren,’and nothing which concerns her will leave him indifferent or detached; he will root himself in her soil, form himself in her likeness and make himself one with her experience.  He will feel rich with her wealth; he will be aware that through her and her alone he participates in the unshakeableness of God.  It will be from her that he learns how to live and from her that he learns how to die.”

While I know there are many difficulties and struggles in the Church today (I know, what’s new?), I am convinced that we are in a unique and blessed time (I know, what’s new?) with great opportunities to proclaim the truth, goodness and beauty of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I am in the midst of preaching a five-homily series, A Renewed Catholic Spiritual Roadmap of Life, which includes the proper place of evangelization (helping people to meet Jesus and make them his disciples).  If you would like to listen to them you can go to www.st-lawrence.org as each of them are posted.

The Pope, the Eucharist, and Mary

The Pope, the Eucharist, and Mary

            The Pope, the Eucharist, and Mary. These three words summarize the most vivid area of disagreement between Catholics and other Christians. Most converts will admit that confusion with one of these realities was the last obstacle they had to overcome before finally entering the Church. As to those who do not convert, Catholic teaching on these three areas appears extravagantly theoretical and foreign to the basic gospel message. After all, where is “transubstantiation” in Scripture? What about “infallibility” or “immaculately conceived”? The Catholic doctrines concerning Mary, the Eucharist, and the Pope seem to many to be utterly groundless innovations of a Roman theology that has become hopelessly speculative.

            After all, what’s the point? Why do we need Mary and the Pope and the Eucharist? Why become distracted with these fringe issues when all that matters is that the Christian grow in divine life? All we want, all we need, is a personal relationship with God.

            Fair enough. That is all we want, and that is all we need. But there are two things to keep in mind when we talk about a personal relationship with God. The first is that God isn’t a person, He’s Three Persons. The second thing to remember is that a personal relationship can only be cultivated if there’s a point of contact – it might be through words, or through physical connection or through some other kind of expression, but you can’t build a relationship in a vacuum. So the question becomes: what are those contact points where Christians can relate to God, where they can cultivate a loving connection between themselves and the Father, Son and Spirit? Well, the answer of the Scriptures and the Catholic Church of today is pretty clear; those contact points are Mary, the Eucharist, and the Pope.  

            The Pope: Point of Contact with the Father

            The Catholic Church has always seen the establishment of the papacy as being rooted in Matthew 16:13ff, where Christ gives Peter the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Before doing so, however, Jesus quizzes the Apostles on what people are saying about his identity. Of course, the poll comes back inconsistent, inconclusive and ultimately, inaccurate: “John the Baptist,” “Elijah,” “Jeremiah,” or some other prophet. So you can’t get the truth about Jesus just by doing a survey. Then Jesus asks the Apostles as a group, “Who do you say that I am?” The Apostles are silent. No one, apart from Peter, says a word. Maybe that’s why the Orthodox, who still have successors of the Apostles, haven’t been able to call a general council since they separated from the Pope. Apart from Peter, they are silent. In any case, Peter steps forward and gets the right answer, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”

            How does Jesus react? By saying this, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father.”

            What, then, is the source of Peter’s gift, of Peter’s true and reliable profession of faith? It is the heavenly Father. He who before all Ages uttered the Eternal Word now gives His revealed word through the lips of Peter, the Rock.

            People form relationships through words. If there’s someone you love, you ask that person to tell you about themselves, and they tell you by talking. God the Father speaks to us still, He expresses the truths about who He is and what He has done. And He speaks these words clearly, and reliably, through Peter and through Peter’s successor, the Pope. The Pope is the verbal contact point between us and the First Person of the Trinity, so that the teachings of the Holy Father can enable a relationship with our Father who Art in Heaven.

            The Eucharist: Point of Contact with the Son

            When Christ gave His Apostles the command, “Do this in memory of me,” they obeyed by the solemn and perpetual celebration of the sacred mass. When Christ assured them, “Know that I am with you always, even to the end of time,” we understand that assurance to refer to His physical abode in the tabernacle. When Jesus said, “my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink,” (Jn 6:55) Catholics imagine the taste and texture of the Host.

Of the Three Persons, only the Son took on flesh, and it is that same flesh which the Catholic Church treasures in the sacrament of the Eucharist.

            People form relationships through bodily contact. Two men are brothers when the same blood runs in both their veins, and we become brothers of Christ because His blood, which we drink from the sacred chalice, runs in our veins as well. A man and a woman have a spousal relationship which they express by the commingling of their bodies, and we become Christ’s brides when we receive his Sacred Body into ours. Friends embrace upon meeting each other, and surround each other with their arms, but a Catholic embraces the Second Person of the Trinity by eating Him, and surrounding Him with his whole physiology.

Like Thomas, we can touch the risen Christ, not only with our fingers but with our tongues, for we have been given the Eucharist, the physical contact point which lets us cultivate a relationship with the Son of God.

            Mary: Point of Contact with the Holy Spirit

            The Holy Spirit, for most Christians, is the Trinitarian Person with whom it is hardest to cultivate a relationship, because the forms He assumes are deeply mysterious. Take the Baptism of Christ; there we hear the Father speak, and the Son is present in the flesh, but the Spirit comes as a dove. How can we have a relationship with a dove?

            Yet if we can hear the Father’s words through the Pope, and if we can touch the Son’s flesh in the Eucharist, perhaps we can see the work of the Spirit in Mary.

Mary is the one who gives us a picture of what the Holy Spirit is doing. After all, Mary is the one who is “Full of Grace” (Lk 1:28), which means that she was so suffused with the Spirit that there was never an disparity between what the Spirit wanted from Mary, and what Mary did. The result is, if we want to see the effects of the Holy Spirit on a mere creature, like ourselves, we have only to look at her. That’s why the Holy Spirit’s impact on the world is done through the Blessed Virgin. When the Holy Spirit causes the Christ to enter the world as an embryo, it is in Mary’s womb. When the Holy Spirit creates the Church on Pentecost, Mary is there (Acts 1:14).

Sometimes people cultivate relationships by just looking. We can relate to an artist through his artwork, we can learn from an expert by watching, and we can interpret the meaning of certain visible actions, as in the case of sign-language, in such a way that brings us closer to the agent.

In this way we can form a relationship with the Holy Spirit through Mary. She is His masterpiece and the manifestation of His work.[1] If we would meditate on what the Holy Spirit does, we can see it done in Mary, for “In Mary, the Holy Spirit fulfills the plan of the Father's loving goodness.”[2] She is the visual contact point, the “Sign”[3] which lets us cultivate a relationship with the Holy Spirit. It may be difficult to build a strong connection with the Holy Spirit using the images of fire, wind, cloud or a dove, but it isn’t hard to build a strong connection with the Holy Spirit using that most beautiful image of the perfect Woman and Mother.

            The doctrines of the Church concerning the papacy, the Blessed Sacrament and the Mother of God, aren’t extras. They aren’t just intellectual conclusions that Catholicism entails, for whatever reason, which might be interesting for people with a lot of time on their hands but don’t matter much to everybody else. They are the bridges by which the Father, Son and Holy Spirit make Themselves accessible, so that we can form a relationship with Them, a relationship which is constitutive of a holy life on earth and unending joy in Heaven.

           

---

[1] C.f., Catechism of the Catholic Church, #721, “Mary, the all-holy ever-virgin Mother of God, is the masterwork of the mission of the Son and the Spirit in the fullness of time. For the first time in the plan of salvation and because his Spirit had prepared her, the Father found the dwelling place where his Son and his Spirit could dwell among men. In this sense the Church's Tradition has often read the most beautiful texts on wisdom in relation to Mary. Mary is acclaimed and represented in the liturgy as the ‘Seat of Wisdom.’ In her, the ‘wonders of God’ that the Spirit was to fulfill in Christ and the Church began to be manifested.”

[2] Ibid., #723.

[3] C.f., Ibid., #2674, “Mary, his mother and ours, is wholly transparent to him: she ‘shows the way’ (hodigitria), and is herself “the Sign” of the way, according to the traditional iconography of East and West.”

Evangelize Kansas!

Thank you to Fr. Andrew for this invitation.  I am honored to be a part of this great mission and humbled to be included with a the list of contributors I respect very much.  I am a Catholic young adult and guidance counselor at Bishop Ward High School in Kansas City, KS.  My roundabouts include growing up at Prince of Peace Parish (Olathe), St. Thomas Aquinas High School (Overland Park), Kansas State University (Manhattan), Augustinian Volunteers (Chicago), then Villanova University (Philadelphia).  I am happy God has brought me back to Kansas!  

As I begin my seventh year working as a young adult in Kansas City I continue to see his great purpose for me here and love meeting new people on fire for the gospel.  While I was formed by my Catholic education, the St. Isidore Catholic Center, and the Augustinians (to name a few!), I appreciate great sources of grace and community that I have discovered here in Kansas since I have returned.  A few of these reservoirs include St. Paul’s Outreach and City on a Hill.  This summer I had the opportunity to renew my faith even deeper by going on a pilgrimage with School of Faith to the Holy Land which was very renewing to my soul.  You may check out the blog from our journey here.  I have also been spiritually fed by my friendship with religious communities that surround and support my high school in Wyandotte County which include the Little Sisters of the Lamb and Sisters Servants of Mary.  I enjoy volunteerism and regular events for me include Shalom House and serving at the Wyandotte County Pregnancy Clinic.  I am also very involved (10 years and rolling) and have a huge heart for prison ministry. I look forward to what the Lord has in store for us through this blog and will take St. Therese as my patron to follow in her “Little Way”.  

May God fill you with his Peace this day!

Jordan River, Summer 2013

Glad to be here

Hi. Just a quick bio for me: 
I've been working in this Archdiocese for the last eight years for the School of Faith and the St. Lawrence Center at KU, where I'm the editor for the periodical Thesauri Ecclesiae, a journal of faith and culture. I give presentations mainly to adult parishioners, Catholic school faculties, and undergraduate students. I have my doctorate in theology from the Regina Apostolorum in Rome, and I turned my dissertation into a book with the University of Scranton Press. It's called: The Drug, the Soul, and God: A Catholic Moral Perspective on Antidepressants. I also try to spend some time doing theology and philosophy, and I've been able to get a few papers published in journals like The Thomist, The Fellowship of Catholic Scholars Quarterly, and Homiletic and Pastoral Review, as well as a couple other places. I've had the opportunity to debate the atheistic activists Dan Barker, John Corvino (on Same-sex marriage), Matt Dillahunty and JT Eberhard (you can see all those debates on youtube). My wife Jessica and I have three children (as far as I know) and we live in Lawrence, Kansas.

Advice from a Bishop to his Priests

Priests waiting to get into the game - Photo by Michele Gress

From Rome:

In response to a question on pastoral service, Francis reiterated that one should not “confuse creativity with making something new. Creativity is finding the path to proclaim the Gospel and...this is not easy. It is not simply a question of changing things. It is something different, it comes from the spirit and passes through prayer and dialogue with people, with the faithful”. The Pope recalled an experience he had as archbishop of Buenos Aires, when a priest was seeking a way of making his church more welcoming: “Ah, if many people pass this way, perhaps it would be good if the church were open all day ... Good idea! And it would also be good if there were always a confessor available there. ... Good idea! And so it went on”.

This, he explained, is “courageous creativity”, and it is necessary to “find new paths”. The Church, “and also the Code of Canon Law”, he added, “give us many, many possibilities, so much freedom to look for these things. ... We must find those moments to welcome and receive the faithful, when they enter the parish church for one reason or another”. He severely criticised those who were more concerned about asking for money for a certificate than with the Sacrament and therefore “keep people away”. Instead, there must be a “cordial welcome” so that those “who go to Church feel at home. They feel comfortable and do not feel as if they are being exploited. ... When people feel there are economic interests at work, they stay away”.

Francis proposed to the priests of Rome the figure of the “missionary priest”. A priest should always keep in mind his first love, for Jesus. “For me”, he said, “this is the key point: that a priest has the capacity to return in memory to his first love. ... A Church that loses her memory is an electronic Church, without life”. He advised the priests of his diocese to beware of both severe and lax priests. “Instead, the merciful priest proclaims that 'God's truth is this, so to speak, dogmatic or moral truth', but always accompanied by God's love and patience”, adding “Do not panic – the good God awaits us. ... We must always keep in mind the word 'accompany' – let us be travelling companions. Conversion always takes place on the street, not in the laboratory”.

Before the meeting, a document was given to the priests:

In the paper, the then archbishop of Buenos Aires discussed how in Aparecida one became aware of changing times, “not in the many partial ways that anyone might find in the daily actions one performs, but rather in the meaning that gives unity to all that exists”.

“The defining aspect of this change of epoch is that things are no longer in their place. Our previous ways of explaining the world and relationships, good and bad, no longer appears to work. The way in which we locate ourselves in history has changed. Things we thought would never happen, or that we never thought we would see, we are experiencing now, and we dare not even imagine the future. That which appeared normal to us – family, the Church, society and the world – will probably no longer seem that way. We cannot simply wait for what we are experiencing to pass, under the illusion that things will return to being how they were before”.

In the document, Bergoglio presents the mission as a proposal and challenge in the face of these changes, and encourages the pastor to be “an ardent missionary who lives the constant desire to seek out the remote, not content with simple administration”, and reiterates that “a transformation in pastoral action and a consequent transforming pastoral action can only occur when mediated by the interior transformation of the agents of pastoral care and the members of the community they form. … To become once again a Church driven by evangelical momentum and audacity, we must again become faithful and evangelised disciples”.

Archbishop Fisichella and the New Evangelization

"Today, God is not denied, but is unknown. In some respects, it could be said that, paradoxically, interest in God and in religion has grown. Nevertheless, what I note is the strong emotive connotation [...]; there is no interest in a religion and much less for the theme of the 'true religion'; what seems to count are, rather, religious experiences. People are looking for different modalities of religion, selected by everyone taking up that which they find pleasing in the sense of ensuring for them that religious experience which they find more satisfying on the basis of their interests or needs at the moment...The new evangelization requires the capacity to know how to give an explanation of our own faith, showing Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the sole savior of humanity. To the extent that we are capable of this, we will be able to offer our contemporaries the response they are awaiting. We need to direct our reflection towards the meaning of life and death, and of life beyond death; to face such questions, those affecting people's existence and determining their personal identity, Jesus Christ cannot be an outsider. If the proclamation of the new evangelization does not find its power in the element of mystery which surrounds life and which relates us to the infinite mystery of the God of Jesus Christ, it will not be capable of the effectiveness required to elicit the response of faith. Hiding away in our churches might bring us some consolation, but it would render Pentecost vain. It is time to throw open wide the doors and to return to announcing the resurrection of Christ, whose witnesses we are. The road to be followed is by no means easy. It requires that we remain faithful to the fundamentals and, precisely for this reason, are capable of constructing something coherent with those foundations, which at the same time are able to be received and understood by people who are different from those of the past. The trials will be numerous. Along this path, we must avoid traveling alone, we cannot do this; we are incapable of it; by nature we are Catholics, that is open to all and wishing to be alongside each person to offer them the company of the faith.

Hence, the new evangelization starts from here: from the credibility of our living as believers and from the conviction that grace acts and transforms to the point of converting the heart. It is a journey which still finds Christians committed to it after two thousand years of history. Within this context, it is worth recalling a story from the Middle Ages. A poet passed by some work being conducted and saw three workers busy at their work; they were stone cutters. He turned to the first and said: 'What are you doing, my friend?' This man, quite indifferently, replied: 'I am cutting a stone.' He went a little further, saw the second and posed to him the same question, and this man replied, surprised: 'I am involved in the building of a column.' A bit further ahead, the pilgrim saw the third and to this man also he put the same question; the response, full of enthusiasm, was: 'I am building a cathedral.' The old meaning is not changed by the new work we are called to construct. There are various workers called into the vineyard of the Lord to bring about the new evangelization; all of them will have some reason to offer to explain their commitment. What I wish for and what I would like to hear is that, in response to the question: 'What are you doing, my friend?', each one would be able to reply: 'I am building a cathedral.' Every believer who, faithful to his baptism, commits himself or herself with effort and with enthusiasm every day to give witness to their own faith offers their original and unique contribution to the construction of their great cathedral in the world of today. It is the Church of our Lord, Jesus, his body and his spouse, the people constantly on the way without ever becoming weary, which proclaims to all that Jesus is risen, has come back to life, and that all who believe in him will share in his own mystery of love, the dawn of a day which is always new and which will never fade."

- Archbishop Fisichella, President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting New Evangelization

Spirit and Truth

One of the privileges of each bishop of the Catholic Church is to celebrate the Sacrament of Confirmation with members of his local church.  Having a successor of the Apostles call down the same Holy Spirit that filled the Upper Room on Pentecost is a powerful experience.  The grace necessary to set the world on fire for Jesus Christ fills that moment.  Hearts are set ablaze and sent on mission to share the joy of being a disciple of the Lord of Life.  Like the saints whose names they've taken, the fully initiated Christian has a clear mission: go make disciples of all nations.

Descent of the Holy Spirit - Photo by Michele Gress

With such a serious mandate, preparation for Confirmation should be as thorough and robust as possible.  In an effort to aid that preparation, Archbishop Naumann has developed a booklet for teens.  The booklet is called "Fifty Truths Every Catholic Teen Should Know."  The world doesn't need clueless or uncatechized Christians.  By receiving this booklet to compliment their other preparation, every teen confirmed in the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas should have no excuse for not knowing the central truths of the Faith.

Fifty Truths Every Catholic Teen Should Know

I know what it's like to be a clueless Christian.  When I was walking down the aisle of my home parish in high school toward the bishop, my father asked me what saint's name I had chosen.  Close enough to almost smell the Sacred Chrism, I responded, "What are you talking about?"  My dad told me I needed to choose a saint's name.  In a panic, I asked him who I should choose.  As we approached the bishop, I announced my hastily chosen patron.  The only problem is that my dad and I can't remember which saint we chose.  To this day, I don't know if I was confirmed as "Hubert" or "Herbert."  Clueless.  "Fifty Truths" might not have prepared me to choose a patron saint, but it would have been useful to have on my shelf as I started to appreciate the depth of the Catholic Faith later on in life.

This new booklet follows the classic question and answer style of many catechisms.  I appreciate the booklet for its clarity and citations.  Under each question and answer, four references are noted: Sacred Scripture, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, the Compendium to the Catechism, and the YouCat.  Additionally, sayings from various saints are printed throughout this concise resource.  Copies are available for order and it can also be downloaded for free.  Hopefully, these truths will be digested, accepted and proclaimed.

Little Monastery, Bright Light

"I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life" (John 8:12)

LUMEN CHRISTI Monastery in Kansas City, KS

"LUMEN CHRISTI" (the Light of Christ) Monastery was consecrated by Archbishop Joseph Naumann on September 14, 2013.  The "Little Monastery" is the new home for the Little Sisters of the Lamb in Kansas City, KS.  The monastery is the first of its kind for the Community of the Lamb in North America.  Gathering friends from across the world both on location and through live streaming, the grace of God was called down to dedicate this new home for the community to Jesus Christ, the Light of the World.  Under the patronage of St. Agnes, LUMEN CHRISTI Monastery will serve as a furnace of God's love and mercy.

The Sacred Liturgy and Blessing can be viewed here: Part One, Part Two and Part Three.  Also, be sure to check out the photos of the building process.

In an article for the National Catholic Register, Archbishop Naumann explains the unique charism of the Little Sisters:

The sisters came to Kansas City at the invitation of Archbishop Joseph Naumann who encountered their community in Rome. Archbishop Naumann believes that the effectiveness of their ministry flows from their poverty, which requires them to go out and beg for their daily bread and, in the process, share the Gospel with those they meet.
“By coming in poverty, many people welcome them,” the archbishop said. “Their strong and beautiful prayer life sustains them in living out this radical poverty.”
The sisters travel in threes to beg for their daily bread in the tradition of St. Dominic. They offer to pray with and for the people they meet and share the Gospel with them. Their motto is “Wounded, I will never cease to love.”

It was fitting that the dedication took place on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross considering how close the Community of the Lamb is to the Wounded Lord.  Seeking out the poor and suffering in any given neighborhood, the Little Sisters serve as beautiful instruments of the Holy Spirit for the New Evangelization.

"I have seen the Lord" (John 20:18)

Perpetual Adoration at the Little Monastery

Founded 35 years ago, the Community of the Lamb is still a relatively young and definitely growing community.  The newspaper for the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas, The Leaven, explains:

Foundress Little Sister Marie said she had no idea she was starting a community 35 years ago in France. As a young Dominican Sister, she only knew that she had a big question in her heart.
“In our world, evil seems so many times so triumphant,” she explained. “And this question was in my heart. I believe it is in all human beings’ hearts: Tell us, Lord, how are you victorious over all evil?”
The answer came to her during a night in silent adoration.
“In the middle of the night,” she said. “this sentence of St. Paul’s arose in my heart: In his own flesh, Christ destroyed the enmity; in his own person, he killed hatred! (Eph: 2:13-19)
“I understand now, the Community of the Lamb was born in that moment.”
The motto of the community is: “Wounded, I will never cease to love.” Its charism is to live the Gospel and Jesus’ life in community.
“United to Jesus and filled with the love of God, we become the sent ones,” Little Sister Marie explained.
“Through the mercy of God we go, ‘without gold or silver,’ in order to give out the name of Jesus,” she explained. “We go like Jesus went — poor and begging the love of mankind; we beg for our daily bread, announcing the Gospel to all.”
“This is the living water of the charism,” she added. “The living water, because it is always renewed in adoration and in prayer and in our union to Christ.”
Today, the Community of the Lamb includes 130 Little Sisters and about 30 Little Brothers from many countries serving in communities around the world.

At the end of the Mass, the foundress, Little Sister Marie, invited the supporters of the Little Monastery to become adorers.  She noted that 4,000 different donors had made the Little Monastery possible, and it was now time for them to become 4,000 adorers before Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament.

 "Do not work for food that perishes but for the food that endures for eternal life" (John 6:27)

The simplicity and joy of the Little Sisters is truly attractive and inviting.  Their way of life challenges a culture of excess while at the same time giving hope to the poor who they live among.


The cells for the sisters are extremely modest.  In addition to their own rooms, they now have four rooms for young women who want to visit the community and rooms for priests to have days of prayer away from the noise of the world.

As I toured the newly blessed rooms and saw the sincere interest of the guests and benefactors, my heart was warmed at the possibilities.  If these sisters could become so small so as to get out of Christ's way, others can as well.  Talking to the sisters after Mass and asking for their prayers, I was reminded how truly simple and straightforward their view of evangelization is: first you must live it.  That's it: first you must live it.  In their view, the New Evangelization occurs through witness before words.  From the beginning, the vision for the Little Monastery kept that call to live the Gospel in mind.  The National Catholic Register article from three years ago highlighted this vision:

Sister Bénédicte described the planned monastery as a simple structure in keeping with their charism. “It reflects in its architecture the message of the Gospel,” she said. “A simple building to be part of the New Evangelization, to go back to the basics. Each aspect of our life reflects the simplicity and beauty of the Gospel.”

The Refectory at the Little Monastery

Such simplicity flows from their encounter with Jesus Christ in prayer.  As Archbishop Naumann was blessing the monastery, the sisters prayed the following prayer, between chanting antiphons of "Behold, the Lamb of God, resplendent of the glory of the Father, of the Glory of his most holy Passion, Light and complete joy of our hearts":

In the last few months one has often heard the complaint that many prayers for peace are still without effect.  What right have we to be heard?  Our desire for peace is undoubtedly genuine and sincere.  But does it come from a completely purified heart? Have we truly prayed "in the name of Jesus," that is, not just with the name of Jesus on our lips, but with the spirit and in the mind of Jesus, for the glory of the Father alone, without any self-seeking?

Might we all be less self-seeking and more fervent to call on the name of the Lord.  St. Agnes, pray for the Community of the Lamb!