Home Visitation Booklet (download)
Sr. Louise Alff from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia once again shares with us one of her practical guides. This time it is for Home Visitation.
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Proclaiming Christ 2008: National Online Conference
Join your ministry peers from all over the U.S. for an online conference dedicated to Catholic evangelization! Proclaiming Christ 2008 will take place over the internet September 9-October 16. Pre-recorded presentations will be posted September 16, 17, and 18. Access to presentations, exhibits, daily prayers, and discussion groups will continue 24/7 through October 16.
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Personalizing the Pauline Year
As we enter the second month of year-long celebrations to mark the second millennium since the birth of the apostle Paul, we might ask: What was his major theme? How might that theme give a focus to the efforts of local congregations and individual Christians in the year ahead?
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Is Someone You Know Thinking About Returning to the Church? (Handout)
Some say that evangelization “is the fine art of paying attention to others.” As we befriend them, they give us all kinds of cues about themselves—how they feel about their lives, what they are thinking about, and where they are going. Lorene Hanley Duquin, author, speaker and Catholic evangelizer notes that inactive Catholics who are considering returning to the Church often give us some concrete signs or cues.
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Arch/Diocesan Positions Available
The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Diocese of Harrisburg have evangelization positions available.
The Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon is seeking a Director of Adult Faith Formation.
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Celebrating the Year of St. Paul
The Pauline Year. This year—from June 28, 2008 to June 29, 2009—is a special year dedicated to St. Paul. Pope Benedict XVI has proclaimed this Pauline Year to celebrate the 2,000th anniversary of St. Paul’s birth. While we are not sure exactly of the year he was born, this is about as close as scholars can come from the available evidence.
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Extending Invitations--A Handout
John Boucher gives us an exercise that helps parishioners reflect on how inviting their parish is.
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Fishing for Inactive and Alienated Catholics
On June 5, 2008, a record-breaking audience of 292 clergy, religious, and laity logged onto their computers and turned up their speakers to attend “Fishing Nets and Fishing Poles: Reaching Inactive and Alienated Catholics,” presented by Lorene Hanley Duquin. The session was part of PNCEA’s Catholic Speakers Online series, made possible this year by a grant from the Our Sunday Visitor Institute.
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Initiatives for Peace and Nonviolence within Islam
“Peace is the command of a merciful God,” said Abdul Said Aziz in his opening remarks at a May 5th conference on Islamic Traditions of Peace and Nonviolence at American University in Washington, D.C.
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“How-To” for Evangelization Teams--A Manual to Download
Sr. Louise Alff, Coordinator for Parish Evangelization for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, shares with us a simple 12-page guide for parish evangelization teams that are getting started or are starting anew.
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Reflections on Faith-Sharing in Small Groups—Slide Presentation and Handout
Sr. Susan Wolf, SND, provides an 8-minute narrated slide presentation on faith sharing, what it is and how we can foster it in our parish communities. John Boucher has developed an exercise on faith sharing to use in small groups with this presentation or by itself.
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He Came as a Witness to Truth
The theme of taking responsibility for witnessing to our understanding of the truth surfaced continually in Pope Benedict XVI’s talks during his visit to the U.S. in April of this year. What he chose to say and do was an object lesson in someone having the courage of his convictions and “walking his talk.”
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2008 Elections and Catholic Social Teaching
On April 24, 2008, just two days after the Pennsylvania presidential primaries, Catholics around the nation went to their computers to view a presentation about the Church’s social teachings. Dr. Georgia Masters Keightley presented “Faithful Citizenship and Political Responsibility” for PNCEA’s Catholic Speakers Online series.
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Who is the Holy Spirit to YOU? -- Handout
At Pentecost we recommit ourselves to our Baptismal vows and to the evangelizing mission of the Church, “Go therefore and make disciples…in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit….” (Matt. 28:19) But who is the Holy Spirit who was so evident at Pentecost? Who is this Holy Spirit that we invoke with the Sign of the Cross? How does the Spirit have a place in everyday life?
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Catholic Witness in Social Justice Ministries
Mr. Anthony Bosnick writes: One of my deepest desires is that the many people involved in the Church's social justice ministries will see these ministries as opportunities to share the Good News. Related to this is a desire that those involved in the evangelization ministries of the Church will see opportunities to share the Good News through social outreach ministries.
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Lenten Reflections by Parishioners for Parishioners
Mrs. Alta Slagle from St. Paul's Catholic Church in the Diocese of Gary shared with us: During this past Lent, my specific task was to nurture the spirituality of our parishioners. I focused on prayer and Scripture. I decided to divide the Gospel of Matthew into 47 parts, one for each day in Lent. Then I set out to find 47 parishioners
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Revisiting the Catholic Ecumenical Directory
Anniversaries provide us with an occasion to look back in gratitude for the richness lived and to rededicate ourselves to carrying forward the vision that inspired us at the outset. Fifteen years ago this month, the Catholic Church’s Directory for the Application of Principles and Norms on Ecumenism (ED) was authorized by Pope John Paul II for use throughout the Church.
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Letting ‘God’s Word’ Evangelize YOU (Handout)
Pope Benedict XVI believes that rediscovery of the ancient practice of "lectio divina" (prayerful meditation or “divine reading” of Scripture) is key to continuing the evangelizing mission of the Church. John Boucher has prepared a handout that offers five steps to prayerful reflection on sacred scripture.
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Monasticism's Protestant Reclamation
If you think of monasticism as a Catholic and Eastern Orthodox expression of Christian life, and something absent from Protestantism, think again. While some Evangelicals in the North American context are gaining notoriety as the "new monastics," in Europe monasticism has been slowly filtering back into the Protestant experience among both men and women since World War II.
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Pope Benedict XVI Visits U.S.
It is not often that a pope visits the United States. So, Pope Benedict XVI’s April 15-20 visit to the U.S. is an historic and important occasion. The theme of his visit is “Christ our Hope,” following the topic of his 2007 encyclical "On Christian Hope."
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CARA Reflections on the Pew Forum's "U.S. Religious Landscape Survey"
Media reports of a new study released this week by the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life highlighted one of the study’s findings: that people raised Catholic have left the faith in greater numbers than those raised in other religious traditions. The report also claimed that these losses have been masked by a corresponding influx of immigrant Catholics.
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Parish Christmas Carol Festival-Reaching Out to Inactive Catholics
John Boucher from the Diocese of Trenton tells us about a creative way to reach out to inactive Catholics during the Christmas season.
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Door-to-Door Evangelization
It’s no secret that few Catholics relish door-to-door evangelization efforts. So when Fr. Rory Conley and the evangelization committee of St. John Neumann Church in Gaithersburg, Maryland decided to give the approach a try in their parish, there was some question about how successful the effort would be.
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Muslims: A Reality Check
Current events in a country bridging Europe and Asia are offering an important object lesson about the Muslim world: it is not monolithic, and there are significant forces for religious pluralism and democracy within it. The country is Turkey, at one and the same time a candidate for the European Union (EU) and the source of much of the water in the Middle East. It is larger in population than any EU country and bigger in military strength than any NATO member after America.
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