Walking the Rite way

During the early part of this year we had talked increasingly about our hopes for future developments in implementing the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults. We discussed wanting to begin year-long invitation opportunities for people who may wish to know more about living a Catholic Christian life.

Our other main area of concern was how to be much more faithful to including, or should it be allowing, the whole parish to take its due role in evangelisation and catechesis. That is, to “be always fully prepared in the pursuit of its apostolic vocation to give help to those who are searching for Christ”. Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults, n9.  How do catechists, in the task of assisting an initiation process, avoid at best being the ‘yeast’ consciously working on behalf of the parish and at worst an exclusive group? We need to unveil more the role of parishioners as threshold companions.

If something like monthly opportunities to meet with, question and find welcome from catholics were to happen we had to involve all parishioners. Both objectives went hand in hand. We knew that perceptions and experience of RCIA could develop more with this process.

To begin with the discussion needed to be opened up for fresh dialogue…to start a ripple effect at least. Hence, parishioners representing some ministries, activities and interests, as well as different age groups were personally invited to come together to explore ways in which we could become an even more welcoming parish.

The Spirit of God doesn’t hang around waiting for our ideas to come to fruition, of course. We had thought that our hopes for regular welcome sessions may be our fresh way to being open to inquirers. The week before the exploratory meeting inquirers came seeking! The ventures happily became parallel sooner than anticipated.

Thankfully, when the invited group met they did not want to hear and then just rubber stamp the ideas proposed but responded to the questions raised and added their own. What happened was an appraisal of how welcome is experienced by all and how it could be. We prayed together, reflected and explored suggestions about who the people are whom we want to welcome. The list included: ourselves, new parishioners, the curious, those who may wish to re-discover a once familiar belonging along with those who have a wish to get to know the Lord and us better and may wish to begin a process towards initiation.

What has happened so far is that the discussion continues among parishioners as the group talk with others. The newsletter was used to alert all to the meeting beforehand and to give a brief account of the ongoing nature of the enterprise. One of the most heartening outcomes was a date in diaries to meet again as a steering group – one that is open and inclusive and listens. A decision that will be worked on initially is to use Christmas, with its customary visitors and ‘returnees’, as a first step in offering invitations to ‘come and see’. It is intended to offer a couple of dates for informal gatherings to be planned for soon after Christmas. Similar action was envisaged for Easter and September. We can work more then with suggestions of how this is to be done and explore materials like those available from CASE (Catholic Agency to Support Evangelisation).

Other questions raised were around how welcome is practiced weekly and how to utilise better our restricted entrance space. Work had begun some time ago on compiling information about the parish in the form of a parish booklet and action was decided on bringing that to fruition.

What we learned was a lesson in how listening and dialogue change and open up ideas – perhaps this is an affirmation of the principle that where even ‘two or three gather together…’ [After apologies, we were 12 or 13!]. We also learned something of the need to change pace in order to include the values and perspectives of others. One step at a time…and need for patience while ‘God gives the growth’!

The hope for yearlong group opportunities to welcome potential inquirers had started with two of us. It took a day or so to realise that this had not been rejected but transformed for the moment and may come in the future. However, there is a sense of shared growth, enthusiasm and responsibility that is enlivening.

Ultimately we have the Spirit of God prodding us to honour the pastoral cycle of continuously bringing ideas together, allowing new ones to be born and moving into action: to explore the mystery of Christ. We are conscious that those of us with leadership in Christian initiation in the parish have the task of keeping the vision of the Rite to the fore in all areas of parish life.

May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with our spirits!

Catherine D

Those who have loved and lost know what Good Friday and Holy Saturday feel like – and know too the yearning for hope beyond them.  The Paschal Mystery at the heart of our faith offers that hope and our sharing of it may start with a simple invitation to come to Mass in November and light a candle in memory of a loved one.

Some seeds of ideas …

• This November, draw on some of the traditions of the Church and live them with catechumens and candidates.
• Consider ways of using this season of remembrance as a means of evangelising with those who plan the liturgy.

• Explore appropriate ways for those involved in bereavement support to act as evangelisers.

The Joy of RCIA Labours

Recently I had the pleasure of visiting an ongoing, parish RCIA group which had just taken its summer break and was coming together once more with the expectation of welcoming two brand new enquirers. It’s quite a while since I was directly involved with a ‘live’ parish RCIA group and I had forgotten the sheer joy a good group can generate: the power of its relationships; the adrenalin rush as new people take those first tentative steps of formal enquiry; the exuberance of newly received Catholics; and the wonder at the diversity of gifts active within a community.

After a warm welcome and a gentle round of introductions, the leader for the night invited two new Catholics to share highlights from their own, very recent journey …

And the words just tumbled out, with an evangelising force that I have rarely experienced before. The two new Catholics were very different: but both mesmerising. I watched the reactions of the new enquirers and they were both inspired and affirmed as some of their own questions and hesitancies were named and the strong support of this community was applauded. These two ‘latest arrivals in the vineyard’ witnessed to a radical conversion centred on the Rite of Election and the unfolding story of the Holy Week. The younger of the two, spoke of her fear that next year’s experience of Easter would somehow disappoint and openly rejoiced in the difference this journey and made and was making to her life and the life of her young family. Throughout this testimony, the other parish accompaniers who share responsibility for the group, listened attentively, nodded in recognition and smiled proudly.

On Sunday we were invited to celebrate Home Mission Sunday and to consider our call to evangelise ‘at home’, on our own doorstep and in our own communities. The gospel parable of the labourers in the vineyard reveals a God who sees things differently to us: who is not concerned with the economics of labour, or market forces; but with the scandal of gifts and talents not being used. A God who has not time for idleness and who rewards all efforts with unbounded generosity.

My visit to this lovely, local group reminded me of the importance of the ministry of the newly received especially in the context of peer evangelisation. It prompted me to give thanks for the work of so many parish RCIA groups up and down our countries and for the contribution they make to the mission of the church ‘at home’.

“The eyes of faith behold a wonderful scene: that of a countless number of lay people, both women and men, busy at work in their daily life and activity, oftentimes far from view and quite unacclaimed by the world, unknown to the world’s great personages but nonetheless looked upon in love by the Father, untiring labourers who work in the Lord’s vineyard. Confident and steadfast through the power of God’s grace, these are the humble yet great builders of the Kingdom of God in history.”

CHRISTIFIDELES LAICI  Pope John Paul II1988

Walking round the local mega-supermarket last year in Autumn (part of a well known ‘family’) was like entering a time-warp. In the same aisle were Halloween costumes, Bonfire Night essentials and a few early reminders that Christmas wasn’t too far away. In the milk aisle, the plastic cow was mooing and the plastic chicken clucked next to the eggs. In the background, over the PA system, someone was giving a commentary on life in the store – bargains on aisle 26, Golf Clubs on aisle 2 – oh, and  “Sandra on aisle 24 is 40 today, lets all sing: Happy Birthday too you…”. By the time I got the shower-gel aisle, I was completely overwhelmed with the endless choices – Which water do I want? What kind of bread do I want? What kind of cereal, soap, ….? The experience became somewhat surreal and for a moment, time stood still and I began to feel like I was caught in some weird sci-fi universe in which “resistance is futile”.

So, what has this got to do with RCIA? The key thing is to trying not to overwhelm people all at once with the speed of the process and all that’s on offer.

As many of our parishes will be preparing to welcome new enquirers over the next couple of months maybe we need to be aware that in new situations people can easily feel overwhelmed, carried along by the momentum of the group and end up feeling a like there’s no way out - or that ‘resistance is futile’. We often speak of meeting people ‘where they’re at’ and not where we want them to be. This requires discernment on the part of the enquirer and of catechists – and it requires us as catechists to be aware of any of our own desires and tendencies which might be coming into play. It also means avoiding the temptation of the October – Easter ‘course’. RCIA is a gradual process, not a treadmill. How does the way we work in parishes allow for the different speeds at which enquirers will journey?

We also need to avoid the RCIA curriculum approach – we’re not about putting everything our faith brings to us on offer all at once – like the supermarket shelves. We are about creating space for an encounter with Christ. As Pope Benedict said recently, Christianity is not a moral code or a philosophy, but an encounter with a person. In speaking of Paul on the road to Damascus he said “this change of his life, this transformation of his whole being was not the result of a psychological process, of a maturation or intellectual and moral evolution, but it came from outside: It was not the result of his thinking but of the encounter with Jesus Christ.”

( http://www.zenit.org/article-23546?l=english)

In exploring the implications of conversion for us as Christians today, he said “We can touch Christ’s heart and feel him touch ours. Only in this personal relationship with Christ, only in this encounter with the Risen One do we really become Christians. And in this way, our reason opens, the whole of Christ’s wisdom opens and all the richness of the truth. Therefore, let us pray to the Lord to enlighten us, so that, in our world, he will grant us the encounter with his presence, and thus give us a lively faith, an open heart, and great charity for all, capable of renewing the world.”

( http://www.zenit.org/article-23546?l=english)

In the middle of August, we have this well-known Gospel, which echoes powerfully with us as a parish,  in the ‘holiday season’ trying to maintain contact with our candidates - feeling we are battling against the odds…..  And He made us get into this wretched boat and go on ahead while he dismissed the crowds (yes, dismissed!) and went up into the hills for a nice quiet time by himself!  We quite fancy a nice bit of quiet ourselves.

Well, in this story there is room for both - time for quiet refreshment in the ’sheer silence’ on the hillside (Community Bible translation of ‘gentle breeze’ (in 1 Kngs 19:12) and with the psalmist to ‘hear what the Lord has to say, a voice that speaks of peace’,  and time for battling with our own fears and immaturity as we attempt to move forward with the process of initiation. 

On reflection, perhaps rather than highlighting Peter’s doubt, it is is his courage and faith that is emphasised when he says in the height of the storm on seeing Jesus walking towards them, ’Order (or ‘tell’)me to come to you’ and Jesus says ‘Come’ and he climbs out and gives it a go!

So what have we been ‘giving a go’ this Summer?  The ‘group’ has not been meeting to break the Word, which could be seen as a disapointment.  However, the sponsors have been alongside our candidates these last weeks, sitting with them at Mass, bringing them to parish picnics, prayer vigils for Zimbabwe, and pilgrimages to local shrines, as well as continuing to share on the Sunday Gospels over a coffee, and telling stories of their own experience, for example, of reconciliation, as this sacramental opportunity approaches for the one who is to be received into full communion in September (on the Feast of the Triumph of the Cross - most appropriate for him).  Our neophyte has got married - so that has been a great joy in the whole parish community.  He specifically wanted the recitation of the Creed in the nuptial mass because it has come to mean so much to him.   So on reflection, the community and the candidates have been quietly getting on with the business of helping ‘those who are searching for Christ in the various circumstances of daily life’. (RCIA9)  Perhaps, gradually we are moving towards a more liturgical/mystagogical apprenticeship!

Today is the feast of St Etheldreda! She was born in AD 636, the daughter of the King of East Anglia, a Christian, who did much for the conversion of his kingdom and neighbouring Wessex. Having been married twice, Etheldreda then built a large monastery at Ely, where she was Abbess for 7 years. Her influence was wide, and many of her friends, relations and courtiers came to her for spiritual guidance. She was a friend of St Wilfrid, and adviser to the young St Cuthbert too. These saints are all part of our rich Christian culture in these islands. It strikes me that over the Summer months, it would be good to introduce our candidates and catechumens to some of our fathers and mothers, sisters and brothers in faith, and it could be fun! We could plan visits and picnics to local convents and monasteries in the town and countryside - ring the guestmaster or pastoral centre in advance to ask - and I’m sure there would be a warm and hospitable welcome, perhaps even a guided tour, and some opportunity to talk about the history of their order or foundation, and their particular charisms. This could be on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon, or one weekday in one of these lovely long Summer evenings. How about a pilgrimmage to a not-to-distant shrine? These would be great opportunities for the parish community to participate very actively in initiating candidates into Catholic Christian life, further developing relationships with them, increasing their sense of belonging with us.

As I write, the gardeners amongst the parish are getting the cemetary ready for an outdoor Mass next Sunday - and I notice two of the candidates have come along to help too. The Mass is for everyone who has someone buried in the cemetary - from the parents of the young lad killed in a helicopter accident last month, to the grandparents of grandchildren who live away from the parish now, and all in between. The graves will be blessed, and then we will all drink sangria in the sunshine (we hope) and talk about their lives and how they influenced us! And in the past, several enquirers have been amongst this group too. So we come back to Etheldreda and other saints in our ’story’ right up to the present day - and as we tell the stories of those who have ‘gone before us marked with the sign of faith’, we will be amazed and humbled at the response, not only in the hearers, but in ourselves too. Perhaps we will find ourselves being seen, and found, and grasped and named and knocked breathless by God - again!
All of a sudden, this year-round catechumenate doesnt seem so hard after all!

In the Gospel of the Fourth Sunday of Advent, we hear that Joseph had learned the news of Mary’s pregnancy. What would have been going through his mind as he tried to work out what to do? The desire to keep his honour wrestling with his desire to protect this young woman from any more disgrace than she was already facing…How many nights had he tossed and turned - before a fateful night on which, it could be said, the history of salvation depended. The Word had become Flesh but was infinitely vulnerable - and would be for many years. How was the Child to be protected in the long years of childhood if this good man rejected the woman who he thought had so seriously betrayed him?

And God sends a messenger to speak to this man in a dream… to enter his troubled sleep with words of comfort - of reassurance.But words that made no sense -what on earth does a child having been conceived by the Holy Spirit mean?

Joseph - like his namesake hundreds of years before - was a dreamer. Like the earlier Joseph, he trusted the dreams - and would have known that dreams are not always sweet - and their interpretation not always comfortable.Hadn’t the first Joseph ended up in Egypt because of his dreams? But then, hadn’t he ended up as Pharaoh’s right-hand man because of his skill in dream interpretation?

And don’t we now know that this Joseph’s dreams were not prophesying a quiet life?

Yet he took Mary into his home and brought up the Child with such love that when Jesus came to try to express something of what God was like, he used the childhood word he would have used for Joseph: Abba.

What was in that dream that led a Jewish carpenter to stake the rest of his life on it?

An angel told him not to be afraid - that all these strange circumstances fall within God’s plan - within God’s great Dream for humanity. For a short time the dreamer catches a privileged glimpse into the Dream and for the rest of his life will play his part in its unfolding.

Those we accompany of their journey come with their own dreams - those glimpses that draw them to God - to enquire ‘what does this mean?’ - to question ‘is it real?’ Perhaps our role as catechists is to act as angels - as messengers of God. We listen to their stories - to their dreams - and we say “don’t be afraid. God is with you.” And we share from our experience of living out our part in the Dream. We speak of other players in the Dream - the great and the small - the ones who sought to interpret and the ones who simply gazed in rapt awe upon the mysteries within it. We tell of those who also staked their lives on the Dream - who gave and give their lives for love of it.  We lead them into rites which earth the Dream in sight and sound and touch and taste and smell - for it is the Dream of the Word Incarnate - en-fleshed - a Dream to be lived out in human bodies. We feed the mind - the imagination - for it is here that the Dream takes root and heart.

Like Joseph, we are keepers of the Dream - but not its owners. We have heard our own angels calming our fears and encouraging us to faith - to hope and to love. Joseph’s charge was the protection of the Child Jesus and his mother - ours to retell their stories. His privilege, it is said, to die with Jesus and Mary at his side - ours to know that his adopted son broke the barriers of death and made real the yearning dream of eternal life. His faith was to face the shattered dream of conventional marriage and family life and to trust the greater Dream through long journeys and exile. Ours is to stand with others in their broken dreams and to brave the journeys and the exiles that form our part of the Dream.

For we have glimpsed the Dream. We have sensed that before we were formed in the wombs of our mothers, God was dreaming of us and of the part we would play in the unfolding of his Great Dream. Our parts may be small - but are no less important for that - for without them the Dream is incomplete.In witnessing our faith, others learn to trust the dream planted in them and to let God’s Dream take root - and grow closer to its fulfilment through those who, like Joseph, dare to dream their dreams and to stake their lives on the truth of the greater and eternal Dream.

Most parish enquiry groups are a mixed bag, so I don’t think ours is unique in that we have two unbaptised teenagers and their uncatechised but baptised Mum; a person who was ‘received’ elsewhere two years ago through one-to-one instruction but has never felt she ‘belongs’ to the Catholic church, and although fully initiated, she comes along to share in the catechesis;  then we have a man whose first marriage has just been annulled, now engaged to a young widow parishioner; another is married to a Catholic whose children are now being prepared for Holy Communion and he wants to think about becoming a Catholic himself;  a woman from a Protestant background with a strong personal relationship with God, but no experience of ‘church practice’; and finally, a woman who met one of our neophytes in a cycling club and is interested in finding out more (about the Church, not cycling!)  

When we first started using the Rites of Initiation of Adults we were worried about this sort of mix, and how to meet each person’s needs.  Now we have stopped worrying!  We see it as real ‘treasure’ for the parish.  Using the liturgical year, and the lectionary, as mainstays for our catechesis, we have found that over a period of between 1 and 3 years our catechumens come to a deep understanding and experience of the mysteries at the heart of our faith. We are no longer ‘driven’  by the time constraints of a more programmatic approach - and we would call this more of an ‘apprenticeship’  into the Catholic Christian way of life - the sort envisaged in the Rite itself.

All these people have knocked at our door at odd intervals since last January, and we have trained ourselves (!) to say ‘Come in’ rather than ‘Come back in September’.  We are muddling our way towards an all-year round ‘Come and See’ enquiry.  By about Advent most people have been with us for several months, and we offer the first opportunity for the Rite of Welcome (or Acceptance).  In looking at the Rite together, seeing what is required, it has been discerned (by us and them) that 3 of our 7 enquirers are ready for this step. And that hasn’t been difficult - people know when they are reay, and we can see the change in them over the months - there is an infectious enthusiasm, an openness to the Gospel, eagerness to learn to pray, to be part of community life.  Others are still a little cautious about what this commitment might mean, and want to carry on asking questions.

With the limited resources in our small rural community, the team decided to have the enquiry and catechumenal sessions on the same night.  This means a welcoming drink and chat, followed by prayer time and gospel sharing together, and then split into the two groups for the deepening catechesis, with two members of the team guiding the process in each group, with sponsors there to support.  The main ‘pillar’ of our catechesis in Advent for both groups continues to be the Sunday gathering, with opportunity to reflect afterwards on the experience of the Liturgy - the heady mix of signs and symbols, gestures and vestures, words and silence, is rich enough fayre for any apprentice to feast on! Leading up to Christmas we have some parish activities planned, and the enquirers and catechumens are actively encouraged to take part in community life - special advent liturgies, an outreach to the elderly housebound, a presentation on our Zimbabwe project - all of this is part of the apprenticeship in the Christian way of life, deepening the awareness of Christ in the season of Advent.  Yes, Christ in history, and Christ who will come again, but most importantly, the Christ who comes and is present is so many ways in our every-day C21 lives.

Resources:

• Have a look at RCIA Network website [www.rcia.org.uk]  for Tool Box for discernment among other things;
• The Liturgy Office  for info on lectionary based catechesis and lectio divina.
• www.cliftondiocese.com produce some resources for year-round lectionary based catechesis
• Shrewsbury (Paddy Rylands) and Brentwood (Nuala Gannon) produce weekly  ’lectio divina’ leaflets.

We all know that our parish community is a warm and welcoming community - its just that sometimes we hide it quite well!

I have three distinct experiences of moving to new areas and finding a new parish. When I left college and took my first job in a completely alien city, I found a warm, welcoming and vibrant parish community - people introduced themselves, told me what kind of things were happening in the parish and invited me to join in with certain groups and activities. When I moved to a new city with a new teaching post, I moved to a very active and lively parish - who didn’t need anyone else. They were quite happy with themselves, thankyou very much. After a couple of months, I gave up. I felt quite invisible. It was a frustrating and isolating experience and for a time, I didn’t go to Church at all until I moved house and thought I’d try again. It was a relief to find a parish where I met families I knew and children I taught. In my present parish (another city), there was a gradual initiation into the community in several stages. Week 1 - nothing. After a couple of weeks, when people began to realise that I was still there, there were a couple of nods of the head. After a month, there were greetings exchanged and finally conversation.

Stepping into a new place, meeting a new community can be very intimidating. Parish communities are no longer as stable and established as they once were - people move for work and a whole variety of reasons. Perhaps in larger parishes, new faces are lost in the crowd. So how do we welcome new people into our communities?

Our readings for the first Sunday of Advent asked us to ‘Stay Awake’. Maybe during Advent and the Christmas season, we can stay awake and watch for the new faces and families who join our communities and perhaps old ones we haven’t seen for a while. We may only meet them once or twice, and how we welcome them on those occasions makes an impression and might well make a difference. Take a special care to notice those who come to Mass on their own. How do we welcome those for whom English isn’t a first language? Do we have information in Polish, Portuguese etc?

Take a parish audit:

• When you walk through the doors of the Church, what is your immediate impression?
• Is the word “Welcome” obvious?
• Is information regarding mass times, facilities and contact numbers (e.g. Children’s Liturgy leaders) immediately noticeable?
• Before Mass, who is there to welcome people?

As the new Church year starts, clear out the clutter of old notices and papers and create a fresh and welcoming space.

The First Sunday of Advent is one of the times, through the year, when many parishes  celebrate the Rite of Acceptance into the Catechumenate. The continuing welcome we extend to those journeying towards initiation or reception into the Church makes a difference to their experience and the experience of the parish journeying with them. What opportunities are there for the two journeys to interact? Celebrate the liturgies of the RCIA publicly during the Sunday liturgy, pray for the Candidates and Catechumens during the General Intercessions, introduce the parish community to the candidates and catechumens and the candidates and catechumens to the parish community. Evidence suggests the welcome of the community both during the journey towards initiation and afterwards makes a difference to whether the newly received stay with the Church or disappear off the radar.

There is information available on the internet.

• Visit Portsmouth diocesan website and for downloads on the Ministry of Welcome, Tips for Being a Welcoming Parish and Keeping in Touch.
• Also CASE Resources which has suggestions for welcoming people back to Church this Advent and Christmas.

Stay awake. Keep watch.