The May 8th issue of OSV Newsweekly includes an article I wrote on how to respond when a loved one leaves the Church:

I had just finished a speaking engagement in a parish when a lady approached. She was in her late 50s, and seemed a bit apprehensive about speaking with me. After a few pleasantries, she came to her point: She was distressed because her two children — a son and a daughter — were no longer practicing Catholics.

She had been a faithful Catholic her whole life and simply didn’t understand how both of her children had turned their backs on their childhood faith. The two of them had taken very different paths away from the Church. Her son was now an evangelical missionary serving overseas, and her daughter was an agnostic with no interest in religion. She was slightly less concerned about her son, but clearly the abandonment of Catholicism by both troubled her deeply.

Unfortunately, this scenario is all too common today. In fact, I would estimate that this is the most common thing I am told by audience members when speaking to groups of Catholics. There are thousands of hurting Catholic moms and dads out there, begging God to bring their children back to the Church and dealing with immense feelings of guilt over the possibility that they are responsible for their child’s lack of faith. A recent Pew Research Center study found that 10 percent of all Americans — 10 percent! — are former Catholics. This makes former Catholics the third-largest “religious group” in the country behind Catholics and Southern Baptists.

So, what can a parent or sibling or cousin do to help his fallen-away family members return to the Church’s fold? Although individual situations are unique, there are some fundamental principles that we can follow to help the former Catholics in our families reconsider the Church.

Continue reading…

One of the great things about going out and publicly practicing your faith is that you never know who you will meet. I received the following report from someone who was participating in our local 40 Days for Life campaign:

There were the five of us [there] from our church. Poured rain, cold but well worth it. Father led us in 3 complete rosary’s.

Lots of folks honked as they went by, not sure if that was in agreement or since it was dark we did not see the universal hand gesture.

Another car pulled over and dropped off eight cups of coffee from McDonalds. Thanked us for what we were doing.

Another guy pulled over and asked if we were collecting money, said he agreed with us, asked how long we were doing this for, so I told him 40 days. Then he proceeded to tell me that he has given up smoking pot for lent. That made my day.

I love this story. Many people disparage Lent, saying it is a relic of an earlier era when Catholics beat themselves up and were too negative. Or it is a “tradition of men” that is too ritualistic. But Lent is a time the Church gives us for purging ourselves from those bad habits which keep us from God. This man who gave up smoking pot for Lent has made a real step in the direction of our Lord, and we know from the Parable of the Prodigal Son that whenever we take a small step to the Father, He runs towards us to embrace us in love. I’m sure that this man’s sacrifice will be honored by the Lord.

Let us be sure to pray for all those who are trying to draw closer to God in some way this Lent.

I have an article in the latest issue of OSV Newsweekly about how to evangelize total strangers:

You are sitting at your son’s soccer game, enjoying the crisp weather and your boy’s joy for the game. Then you hear someone nearby say “Catholic Church,” then “divorce”; suddenly the hair on your neck stands on end and your body tenses.

You realize that two parents next to you are criticizing the Church; they notice you looking at them and ask, “What do you think?”

Now that we live in a post-Christian world, every one of us encounters situations like this. The Catholic Church teaches certain precepts that are simply unacceptable — antithetical, even — to the modern ethos. Standing by those precepts, we open ourselves to criticism and even attack. Furthermore — and sadly — there are scandals surrounding some Church figures that open Catholics up for easy condemnation.

So what are Catholics to do? How do we respond? What are our obligations in these situations?

Continue reading…

Last week the Consumer Electronics Show was held in Las Vegas and the big buzz was for tablet computers. It seems every tech company is jumping on the craze created by Apple’s iPad. What I found fascinating was comparing the sales pitch for these new tablets with the one given by Apple CEO Steve Jobs last year when he announced the iPad.

• When Jobs was talking about the iPad, he spoke about it being “magical” and how it is a great way to experience the Internet. He gave practical examples of using the iPad and emphasized its ease of use and how fun it is to use.

• When the various CEOs this past week introduced their tablets, they talked about how they had dual-processors, included so many gigs of memory, and ran the latest Android OS. They reiterated the great tech specs their tablet had compared to the iPad and other tablet devices.

Which do you think is the more effective sales technique? The non-Apple CEOs were selling toothpaste; Steve Jobs was selling white teeth. Instead of focusing on the details of his product, Jobs instead focuses on how his product will change people’s lives.

So why am I discussing selling tablets on this blog? Because I am, down-deep, a tech geek? Perhaps, but I think this topic tells us something about how to effectively evangelize. Although it can be crude to compare evangelization to sales, in both cases you are trying to influence the decision-making of another person.

If you look at the early Church, especially in New Testament times, you see that the first apostles took the “white teeth” approach to evangelization. They proclaimed that they had seen the risen Lord and that he had transformed their lives. Again and again St. Paul speaks of the transformation his experience with Christ had on his life – and that others can have the same transformation. He did not get into the details of exactly how Christ is God or things of that nature; he spoke of the power of Christ to change lives.

When evangelizing, eventually one will need to discuss the details of the Faith: exactly what the Church teaches and why. But that is not the “lead” in effective evangelization; instead we must proclaim that Christ has changed our lives and that he can change yours as well. Those who are in most need of Christ will be drawn to our experience and it will lead them to want to know more about this Jesus Christ and his Church that have so radically changed our lives.

…that is how one member of my favorite religious order, the Franciscan Friars of the Renewal, describes his vows of poverty, chastity and obedience:

Brothers from the Bronx take on a tough Irish town

This Christmas will be a tough one for many people living in Ireland. The economic crisis there isn’t helping to lift what is a gloomy holiday season. It’s even more challenging in Limerick, the city that featured in Frank McCourt’s memoir “Angela’s Ashes”.

The poverty, unemployment and deprivation portrayed in the book are still features of daily life in the suburb of Moyross. And that’s exactly why a group of men from New York have moved in. Not just any men though – they are Franciscan friars from the Bronx.

People riding in an open air carriage pulled by a horse might be considered quaint if it wasn’t an indication of the troubles that beset the suburb of Moyross. Horses are sometimes used for transport, but they are often abandoned and left to wander through the gritty neighbourhood or a nearby field.

That is also where the drug deals go down.

Burnt out and boarded up houses are easy to find and so is poverty. It is just the kind of place the Franciscan friars of the Renewal were looking for.

“And we were shown this area Moyross and it seemed like a perfect place: there were burnt out houses there was graffiti on walls there dogs and horses wandering around aimlessly sometimes kids wandering around,” said Brother Shawn O’Connor. “So I said this is a good place for us to be.”

O’Connor and four other monks opened their friary here in 2007 by converting three abandoned houses into a simple residence and chapel. Shortly before they moved in, they got a reminder of how tough the neighbourhood was.

Two children were nearly burned to death when three teenagers firebombed the car they were sitting in. But O’Connor and the others saw a need and over the last three years they have worked hard to get to know the community…

The friary’s statue of the Virgin Mary is missing her hands. One of the other boys living near here cut them off a few months back.

“Many of the young people here just have no real proper guidance that’s one thing we found,” admits O’Connor. “They’re very wild. They’re great and they’re wonderful kids but they don’t have any discipline, they don’t have any sense of right or wrong.”

The monks persist with the kids, not shying away from a bit of soccer, or football or some good old fashioned roughhousing. They do it all wearing their grey hooded robes and beards and shaved heads…

Amidst tales of scandal and sexual abuse by priests, the friars are finding both popularity and celebrity.

In 2008, they appeared on a national late night talk show that also featured U2. The monk’s American street cred seemed to charm the audience. The host asked them to describe their vows. Poverty, chastity and obedience, came the reply. Then one friar offered another version.

“Or like we say in the Bronx, no money, no honey and a boss,” and another, the former rap artist, gave his own slant, “no bling bling, no sweet thing and I gotta serve my king.”

These days, Moyross residents like Lorraine Fitzgerald seem comfortable with the monks in their midst, but she admits she couldn’t take them seriously at first.

“I was laughing I have to say it, I was roaring laughing,” Fitzgerald said. “It’s strange looking at men coming in with long dresses and big beards you know, but I mean they are great sports they are.”

17-year-old Nicole said she’s grateful for their presence too. Young people her age are dropping out and drinking, she said, but the monks share their own experiences in order to warn her of the pitfalls.

“You know like it’s not good but you just try your best to stay away from it,” said Nicole. “That’s what the brothers do. They teach us stuff like all that stuff is bad.”

Read full article…

A friend in DC writes,

I’m co-chair of a committee working on Faith Formation for Blessed Sacrament‘s Centennial. We are planning a speaker series aimed at Catholics who are not experiencing their faith to the fullest – perhaps they only go to mass occasionally, perhaps they haven’t been to reconciliation in a long time, perhaps they didn’t receive very good catechises as children and aren’t even really all that sure about the basics of the faith.

We’re actually have our first event on Thursday December 2nd at 7pm. Coming up soon! We have Fr. Jim Greenfield speaking – the topic is “Why Catholic?” meaning why do we do the things we do as Catholics and why should we even want to experience our faith more deeply.

We’re transforming the school auditorium into a pub atmosphere, with tables and votive candles. We’ll have beer and wine and hors d’oeuvres. We will also have childcare! We’re trying to create an open, inviting atmosphere for people to feel welcome and free to ask questions.

I am so grateful for my Catholic faith, and it pains me to think of all the Catholics who are not fully embracing this wonderful gift. So this project has been my labor of love.

Yesterday I wrote about the “new evangelization” that our church leaders are calling for. As I mentioned, our Faith is timeless, and every age needs to find new ways to present this Faith in such a way that it is attractive and appealing to those who are sincere and searching for the truth. This means we must engage the culture in which we live.

But what does it mean to “engage the culture”? How does one go about doing that without falling into the errors and evils of a culture? How do you engage the culture without embracing it? How do we live in the world but be of the world? I think it is helpful to look at a practical example: television.

One of the major cultural touchstones in our day is the television. The influence of TV on modern culture cannot be underestimated. How reality is presented through this medium has had a profound impact on how we view the world around us. Anyone who thinks that television doesn’t change people’s behavior should ask why advertising agencies spent millions of dollars on ads if they don’t change behavior. And if ads – which so many people try to ignore – can influence behavior, what about the shows themselves, which are watched willingly? So there is no question that television is a major cultural indicator (and influencer).

So does that mean that in order to effectively evangelize – to engage the culture -  we must watch television? This is exactly what I have been told in the past when I mention that I don’t own a television and therefore don’t watch the many shows out there now. The fact that I’m only vaguely aware of a show called “Glee” supposedly proves that I can’t engage the culture effectively. But I believe this is a misguided notion and shows a faulty understanding of evangelization.

Evangelization is most effective when it is based on a personal relationship between two people. A study was done on Mormon evangelization and it was shown that people were much more likely to convert to Mormonism if someone they were close to – such as a family member – was already a member of the LDS church. The same holds true for any evangelization effort: it is through close personal contact that people are most likely to be open to any message, including the message of the Gospel.

When I was in college, I was a member of Campus Crusade for Christ. We would go door-to-door trying to get people to “accept Jesus into their hearts”. Usually our efforts failed miserably. Why? Because we were not evangelizing, we were being annoying – we were not engaging the total person in our efforts but were instead just doing (annoying) marketing. (Note: I’m not against door-to-door campaigns – I’ve organized them myself; I’m against the idea of a “hard-sell” type of door-to-door campaign).

Effective evangelization involves a long-term effort and deep relationships. Is talking about the latest TV shows really building a deep relationship, or is it not usually just a superficial way to kill time and be sociable? I do not need to know the latest reality show in order to engage my fellow workers on a deep level, and in fact, keeping a conversation to the level of the latest TV show might hinder that effort. Instead of talking about who is about to be ousted on the latest “reality” show, I can talk about my co-worker’s kids or his ailing mother or his hopes for the future. In other words, I can talk about the things that matter – things that lead to the thing that matters most: a relationship with Christ in the Catholic Church.  What I need to engage the culture is not to drown myself in that culture, but instead to form an understanding of human nature and the issues facing people today and use that understanding to engage each person in the struggles they face each day.

Please note: I am not saying that watching TV is evil. Although I do believe that most shows on television today are harmful and should be avoided – and that too much television watching can subtly affect how you view the world – that does not mean that the act of watching a TV show is immoral. However, the idea that watching television is necessary to engage the culture properly is an idea that has no basis in reality and should be rejected. It is more likely that regular TV watching will lead a person to embrace the culture than it will help them to engage it.

This interview with Fr. Benedict is a few years old, but well worth watching if you haven’t seen it yet. Fr. Benedict talks about his involvement in the civil rights movement, the future of the United States, Mother Teresa and other topics.

Pope Benedict has recently unveiled a new office to promote the “new evangelization” that both he and Pope John Paul II have called for. What does this phrase “new evangelization” mean? After all, as Catholics, we should be rightly suspicious of anything that presents itself as “new” in regard to the Faith, for we believe that the Gospel has been handed down to us through the centuries via Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition and that public revelation ended with the death of the last apostle. We are not Mormons and thus should not accept anything novel or recent when it comes to the content of our Faith, for Jesus Christ was the complete Word and nothing needs to be added to the deposit of Faith.

So what do the popes mean by “new evangelization”? Simply this: the Church needs to re-present the truths of our Faith to societies which were originally seeped in the Gospel but now have become adrift in secularism. We are called to evangelize the “old” Christian countries such as those in Europe and even here in the Americas. The content of the Catholic Faith has not changed – and will never changed – but how we present it must change as society changes. Beliefs that were assumed in previous generations are now challenged and ideas that were rejected a century ago are now accepted at face value.

What does this mean practically? Let me use an example I recently encountered. My daughter is being confirmed this year and I am teaching a class to her and some of her friends to prepare them for this sacrament. In my research, I was reading a book published in 1922 on the Sacraments of Initiation. At one point the book was referring to the practice of bishops administering this rite as opposed to priests, and the main argument given for this was, in so many words, “because the pope says so.” Now it is true that the pope has authority to make the bishop the ordinary minister of confirmation, but an answer such as “because the pope says so” is simply not going to be accepted in today’s world. A Catholic from a century ago might have accepted this, but most will not today. Some might lament this fact, but it doesn’t change the reality of it. When defending and explaining the teachings and practices of the Church, we must first understand the presuppositions of those we are encountering; if we don’t, we risk speaking past each other or even alienating the person to the Catholic Faith. This often means that before we can even present the Gospel we must first lay the groundwork by explaining the natural law and the truths about the human person.

Of course, the “new evangelization” has the same foundations as the “old” evangelization: prayer, fasting and personal sanctity. I don’t care how you present the Faith, if you don’t base it in a life of prayer, fasting and striving for holiness, your efforts will be fruitless. People of every age are attracted to authenticity, and living the faith is still the best preparation for sharing it with others.

St. Paul, pray for us!

Catechism of the Catholic Church translated into the Pidgin language

and in less important translation news, my Rules of Engagement for Catholics on the Internet has been translated into Spanish.

Phil Lawler over at Catholic Culture reports a very insightful exchange between Pope Benedict and a reporter. The reporter asked what the Church can do to be more attractive to the public. After all, the Church is about bringing in new members, right? Not according to the pope:

I would say that a Church that seeks to be particularly attractive is already on the wrong path, because the Church does not work for her own ends, she does not work to increase numbers and thus power. The Church is at the service of another: she serves, not for herself, not to be a strong body, rather she serves to make the proclamation of Jesus Christ accessible, the great truths and great forces of love, reconciling love that appeared in this figure and that always comes from the presence of Jesus Christ. (emphasis added)

How many of us have, even subconsciously, fretted about how unattractive the Church can look at times? After all, we are not going to win any popularity contests with the “right” people. We want the Church to be attractive to Hollywood, Washington, our teens, our relatives, and all those whom we love. This is natural, because we want them to see the Church for what she really is: the Body of Christ and the Ark of Salvation. We know that if people find the Church attractive, they are more likely to investigate her claims, and then might consider joining her ranks.

But Pope Benedict is reminding us that being attractive is not something we can manufacture, nor should it be a goal in our evangelistic efforts. Our attractiveness comes from being faithful to Christ, and even then we will only be attractive to those who desire the good with a sincere heart. We will never be attractive to those who reject God, and trying to make ourselves attractive to them will only lead to a watering-down of the Gospel.

But lest anyone get too carried away, let us also remember that it is not our goal to be unattractive either. I have met some people over the years who have shown no charity along with their proclamation of the truth. When challenged on this, they claim that they don’t care if they are liked, they just want to preach the Gospel. Preaching the Gospel, however, doesn’t mean being a jerk. So while we never want to put “being attractive” as the primary goal of our evangelization, that doesn’t mean we make extra efforts to offend either. We present the truth in the most loving way possible and leave it to the Holy Spirit to impact hearts.

One of the most popular posts of this blog is my Rules of Engagement for Catholics on the Internet. And now, it has been translated into…well, I actually don’t know what language it has been translated in. Does anyone out there know?

Những qui tắc tham gia trên Internet đối với người Công Giáo

Thế giới trực tuyến là một phần thiết yếu của cuộc sống hàng ngày cho người Công giáo trong thế kỷ 21. Trong vài năm qua, internet blogger và người biện hộ, Eric Sammons, đã phát triển một số quy tắc của sự gắn kết cho các tông đồ Internet có thể hữu ích cho mỗi người chúng ta.

Continue reading (if you can)…

As these rules are universal and apply to any Catholic on the Internet, I’m pleased to see that they have been translated. Now I just need to figure out what language this is…

Update: Asute reader Frank pointed me to the Google Translate page, which informs us that this is Vietnamese. Thanks Frank!

The slogan of an Evangelical ministry at Wake Forest University named “Wake” is “Worship. Teaching. Friends.”

That’s right. WTF.

They know the double-meaning (and if you don’t, you should be proud) and are using it intentionally to garner attention from college-aged kids through their slogan “WTF is Wake”. Their banner:

The “Wake” people are very pleased with their new-found “viral” status, and somehow think that by getting attention they are advancing their ministry (even though most observers don’t realize that the double-meaning is intentional). However, “attention” does not mean “evangelization”. The dude who is threatening to burn the Qu’ran is getting attention, but that doesn’t mean he is evangelizing. When are people going to learn that being a media whore doesn’t make you an apostle of the Good News? There is nothing wrong with trying to engage the culture, but efforts like this are just salt that has lost its taste, and we know what that’s good for (Matthew 5:13).

A couple of great articles on the need for all Catholics to evangelize:

From Msgr. Pope: It’s Time to Obey Christ and His Command that We Evangelize

From Aggie Catholics: Witness = Hard / Scary / Non-Negotiable

Make a commitment to do something to evangelize someone today! It’s not as hard (or as painful) as you think!

It is the most secure unwritten rule in American life: you don’t talk about religion in “polite” conversation. Whether it be at work, at home or out in public, we are allowed to talk about just about any topic from sports to the weather to the kids, as long as it doesn’t touch religion. This avoidance of religion extends to popular culture as well. For example, look at this list of TIME magazine’s “50 Best Websites“, grouped by category. Can you see what category is missing? That’s right: religion. “Shopping and Travel” gets its own category (after all, consumerism does consume us these days), but religion has no place at the table.

You can also see this in popular TV and movies. I remember a scene from a popular TV show a few years back when a main character was about to die in a plane wreck. He knew he was to die in just a few minutes, but in the show he made no religious statements nor took any religious actions. Contrast that with reality: when 9/11 occurred, there was story after story of people praying in the face of death, asking God to be with them and their families.

Man is fundamentally a religious species: we are homo religiosus. Every culture that has ever existed has been religious and people naturally are pulled towards religion of some sort. So making religion the one topic that is not to be discussed is absurd; it is like banning discussions of the weather, for religion surrounds us as surely as the seasons do.

And by refusing to talk about religion, we are handing the devil a great victory. One of the greatest challenges for evangelization today is our reticence to talk about religion. Good-natured people who want to share their faith hesitate because they know they are breaking the great unwritten rule of our society and so they fear ridicule and ostracization. Yet Christ himself commanded his followers to evangelize all corners of the earth, and as I have mentioned before, evangelization is not just our actions, but requires words as well. The American reticence to speak of religion is a major barrier to that work, but as Catholics we need to learn to speak up about our Faith, even at the risk of breaking social conventions.