Franciscan at Home

If you were being investigated and the detective had access to highly detailed records of your personal income and spending, what would this evidence reveal about your Christian commitment? How does your credit card transaction registry provide a clue to the seriousness of your Christian faith?

Do these questions sound strange? Oftentimes we aren’t very thoughtful about the relationship between money and faith, yet the way we spend our money reveals quite a bit about who we are and what we value.

It’s no secret that over the past year the use of media has become a near necessity, causing its importance in our youth programs to skyrocket. The conversation about what it looks like to effectively use media within the realm of youth ministry is more paramount today than it has ever been in the Church’s history. 

There is certainly no lack of differing perspectives when it comes to the best media practices, and there’s not necessarily “one right way” to engage with the youth culture through media. But there are most definitely some dangers in regard to the use of media within youth ministry as well as some practices that can help us become lights in the lives of our young people.

On June 25, 2020, the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of the New Evangelization, headed by its president, His Excellency Archbishop Rino Fisichella, presented for the Universal Church a new Directory for Catechesis.

St. Paul did his homework carefully before proclaiming Christ to the Athenians. It paid off. In Acts 17, we find St.

It is not a secret that knowledge of the faith continues to decline. It is tempting to insist simply upon teaching more doctrine, but this overlooks a more fundamental problem. What is catechesis really about? It is not simply knowledge of the faith but knowledge of the living God, a knowledge that includes and goes beyond simply the intellect, as it must include a complete transformation of life. We are not simply missing knowledge of the faith but the entire structure of life and culture that should undergird and support this knowledge.

The Cultural Foundation for Catechesis

Grace builds upon nature, according to the scholastic adage. By “nature,” we mean the natural foundation of human life—our ability to think, make free choices, and order our lives through good habits. Even more foundationally, nature refers the basic soil of human potential that God uses to draw forth his divine fruit. But how would we describe the “state of nature” today? It is not a stretch to say that the soil of human life has worn thin through the saturation of technology and a fundamental change in the way we understand and relate to one another, mediated by a screen with less interpersonal contact. Catechesis has to compensate for these challenges, seeking to build up a more robust community to provide a stronger cultural context to receive the faith.

Just as grace builds upon nature, so faith builds upon culture. In fact, Pope St. John Paul II declared faith to be “incomplete” without a culture to live it out faithfully.[i] Culture is a shared way of life, one that is necessary because Christians need to live out their faith in communion with others. As we know from our own experience, it can be quite difficult to live the Christian life when you are pushing against the cultural currents. Perhaps our religious education has fallen short because we have not attended closely enough to the cultural dynamics of faith. Right thinking, healthy living, rightly ordered work, and robust community all contribute to building up the soil needed to support the Christian life.

In his encyclical letter Redemptoris Missio, John Paul II makes the claim that “since culture is a human creation and is therefore marked by sin, it too needs to be ‘healed, ennobled and perfected’” (John Paul II, Redemptoris Missio, no. 54).

The Intellectual Backstory

Like many statements in ecclesial documents, one needs to know the intellectual history behind the statement above—the “backstory” as it were.

Here part of the backstory is the Romantic-era approach to the subject of culture, including the idea that every national group has its own culture and that each and every national culture is equally of value. In other words, it is a typical Romantic argument that no one culture is superior to another, all are of equal value.

Many people unreflectively adopt something like the Romantic approach because they have a memory of one particular culture (or anti-culture) trying to assert its superiority using tanks and aircraft bombers and gas chambers.

A Catholic theology of culture is, however, radically different from the Nazi ideology of culture. The Catholic vision has absolutely nothing to do with conceptions of racial superiority. Genetics has nothing to do with it. The Catholic conception is all about grace and how some human practices are more or less open to grace than others and thus some cultures are superior or more noble than others because they are more open to grace than others.

Since Catholics believe that all human beings are made in the image of God, whether they are born in one of the culturally sophisticated suburbs of Paris or in a village somewhere that has yet to obtain Wi-Fi, they all begin their lives with the same status before the throne of the Holy Trinity. In this sense the Catholic faith is both universal and egalitarian. Baptism does not recognize class distinctions. Once a person has been baptized they are a member of the Royal Priesthood. As the Orcadian Catholic writer George Mackay Brown poetically explained in his short story “The Treading of Grapes,” in heaven Christ will address his friends with the royal titles Prince and Princess. However, what Catholics do with the gift of their baptismal graces will have an impact upon their own nobility or lack of it, and upon their social practices and their culture. Those who are the most saintly are the most ennobled.

Many readers of this journal are familiar with how John Paul II describes the definitive aim of catechesis. Our objective as teachers of the faith is to lead those we teach into communion, into real intimacy, with Jesus Christ.[1] He is not only to be our model and example. He is not merely our brother and friend. And he is not only our High Priest and Divine Teacher, revealing to us the right way to see reality and live within it.

¿Cómo se hace catequesis durante una pandemia?

Varios meses de separación forzosa de su grupo de RICA o su clase de Primera Comunión no es una contingencia para la cual es probable que algún catequista haya planeado. Sin embargo, aun cuando la vida ordinaria cambia más allá de toda familiaridad, el llamado que hace Cristo a Sus fieles a profundizar nuestra relación con Él ha permanecido constante – y también ha sido constante la necesidad de catequesis que hace eco de aquel llamado divino en Su Iglesia.

La sombría realidad de la cuarentena con su encierre ha incitado una respuesta inmediata e ingeniosa de parte de los catequistas. En la diócesis de Portsmouth, Reino Unido, esta respuesta ha adquirido varios formatos. Examinar cómo los catequistas de la diócesis han respondido a la crisis nos proporciona no solamente amplios ejemplos de maneras en las que la catequesis puede adaptarse a una situación de encierre o de cuarentena -  a la cual la respuesta internacional al COVID-19 quizás no sea la última – sino que también destaca las dificultades y los retos que presenta una tal “catequesis de encierre” y lo que revela acerca de la práctica de la catequesis más ampliamente.

La catequesis en el Reino Unido

El encierre comenzó en el Reino Unido el día 23 de marzo del 2020, al clausurar los negocios, los establecimientos de servicios, y los lugares del culto, y con la prohibición de viajes no esenciales. En ese entonces, los catequistas del RICA se estaban preparando para acoger en la Iglesia a sus catecúmenos y candidatos en la próxima Vigilia Pascual, mientras que los catequistas de Primera Comunión y de Confirmación estaban preparando a sus candidatos para la recepción de los sacramentos en el verano o a principios de otoño. Los catequistas en el Reino Unido trabajan dentro de un contexto que presenta un reto distinto aun sin la carga adicional del encierre: de los 3,129 millones de personas que residen en la diócesis de Portsmouth, solamente 230,000 son católicos – y de ellas, solo el 13% (29,000 personas) practican su fe.[1] Los catequistas son voluntarios normativamente no pagados que hacen caber sus responsabilidades catequéticas alrededor de sus vidas llenas profesionales y familiares.

En Portsmouth, la catequesis recibe el apoyo de un equipo llamado Formación para la Misión, un grupo diocesano compuesto de voluntarios experimentados dedicados a la formación continua de los catequistas. Seis miembros del equipo de Formación para la Misión, activos en varios apostolados en las parroquias de toda la diócesis, compartieron sus experiencias de la cuarentena conmigo: cómo han adaptado, lo que han aprendido, y cómo aquellas lecciones del encierre podrían transformar a la catequesis a largo plazo.

Subiendo la catequesis en línea

Sin excepción, los catequistas con quienes platiqué han hecho uso extensivo de la comunicación digital, principalmente el correo electrónico y la plataforma de videoconferencias Zoom, para mantenerse en contacto – pero, de distintas maneras según su apostolado específico.

Los catequistas de Primera Comunión (PC), por ejemplo, han utilizado el correo electrónico para continuar con una catequesis estructurada, basada en lecciones para los niños a quienes instruyen. Jo, una catequista de PC en Alton, utiliza el correo electrónico para enviar cada semana “un esquema de una lección para que los padres de familia lo realicen con sus hijos”, con una invitación a que los papás le envíen “algún tipo de respuesta de los niños”. Mary, una catequista del Sacramento del Bautismo y de PC en East Hendred, graba sesiones del programa de preparación para los sacramentos, I Want to Make My Home in You [Quiero hacer mi morada en ti] de Come Follow Me [Ven, sígueme] – un programa basado en la Sagrada Escritura que hace uso de grandes tarjetas con siluetas de personajes bíblicas – y las envía “a los padres de familia por correo electrónico para que las pongan a sus hijos, junto con fotos de las tarjetas con las siluetas”. Angela, una catequista de PC en Southampton con responsabilidades adicionales relativas a la catequesis de los padres de familia, envía correos electrónicos para actividades catequéticas adaptadas a los niños: por ejemplo, “la redacción de cartas a los parroquianos ancianos o compañeros de oración en su parroquia”.

How do you catechize during a time of pandemic?

Several months of enforced separation from their RCIA group or First Holy Communion class is not a contingency for which any catechist will likely have planned. Yet even as ordinary life changes beyond all recognition, Christ’s call to his faithful to grow deeper into relationship with him has remained constant—and so has the need for the catechesis that echoes that divine call in his Church.

The grim reality of lockdown has prompted an immediate and inventive response from catechists. In the Diocese of Portsmouth, UK, this response has taken various forms. An examination of how catechists in the diocese have responded to the crisis not only provides ample examples of ways in which catechesis can be adapted to a lockdown or quarantine situation—of which the international response to COVID-19 may not be the last—but also highlights the difficulties and challenges such “lockdown catechesis” poses and what it reveals about the practice of catechesis more broadly.

Catechesis in the United Kingdom

Lockdown began in the UK on March 23, 2020, with the closure of businesses, facilities, and places of worship, and the prohibition of all non-essential travel. At the time, RCIA catechists were getting ready to welcome their catechumens and candidates into the Church at the upcoming Easter Vigil, while First Holy Communion and Confirmation catechists were preparing their candidates for reception of the sacraments in the summer or early autumn. Catechists in the UK operate within a context that is distinctly challenging even without the added burden of lockdown: of the 3.129 million people living in the Diocese of Portsmouth, only 230,000 are Catholic—and of that number only 13 percent (29,000) practice their faith.[1] Catechists are normatively unpaid volunteers who fit their catechetical responsibilities around busy professional and family lives.

In Portsmouth, catechesis is supported by a team called Formation for Mission, a diocesan-wide group of experienced volunteers dedicated to the ongoing formation of catechists. Six members of the Formation for Mission team, who are active in various ministries in parishes across the diocese, shared their experiences of lockdown with me: how they have adapted, what they have learned, and how those lessons of lockdown might change their catechesis in the long term.

Moving Catechesis Online

Without exception, the catechists I spoke to have made extensive use of digital communication, primarily email and the video-conferencing platform Zoom, to stay in touch—but in ways that differ according to their specific ministry.

First Holy Communion (FHC) catechists, for instance, have mostly used email to continue a structured, lesson-based catechesis for the children they are instructing. Jo, a FHC catechist in Alton, uses email to send out “an outline of a lesson for the parents to do with their children” each week, together with an invitation “for some sort of response from the children which the parents can send to me.” Mary, a Baptism and FHC catechist in East Hendred, records sessions of Come Follow Me’s sacramental preparation program, I Want to Make My Home in You—a Scripture-based program making use of large card silhouettes of Scriptural figures—and sends them “to the parents via email to play to their children, along with photographs of the silhouettes.” Angela, a FHC catechist in Southampton with additional responsibilities for parental catechesis, sends weekly emails containing links to online resources for deepening understanding of the faith, as well as suggestions for child-friendly catechetical activities: for instance, “writing letters to elderly parishioners or prayer partners in their parish.”