When a company promotes a product, it goes to great lengths to convince us of what it can do for us. When candidates seek votes, they will provide long lists of accomplishments as proof that they can deliver. When we invite others to embrace Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, we need to provide “evidence” of what Jesus has done, is doing, and can do for each of us. A crucial part of the […]
We continue our summer series, Pop-Up Prayer—brief interviews on the topic of prayer with prominent people in pastoral ministry from all over the country! In this episode, Dr. Ansel Augustine, Director of the Office of Black Catholic Ministries for the Archdiocese of New Orleans, talks about the need to see prayer as both an ongoing conversation with the Lord and something for which we need to carve out time. Be sure to check out the […]
Welcome to our new summer series, Pop-Up Prayer—brief interviews on the topic of prayer with prominent people in pastoral ministry from all over the country! We could all use some tips when it comes to prayer, especially during these very difficult and challenging times. In this episode, Elsy Arévalo, Instructor and Assistant Director of the Center for Religion and Spirituality at Loyola Marymount University, explains that prayer is not about us reaching out to God as […]
When I was in high school, I remember being told by a Jesuit priest (one of my teachers) to listen for God in the silence. This was no easy task. First of all, it was not easy for me to find a quiet place in a home that I shared with my eight siblings! Second, when I did find some silence, I never heard God speaking to me. When I related this to the priest, […]
Jesus’ words reveal to us that we have direct access to a God who is neither remote nor distant, but present. Jesus told parables that present an image of God as one who is relentlessly searching us out and as one who takes great joy in our return to his arms. Our God is accessible, not aloof, withdrawn, or reserved. God is in pursuit of us and will not be satisfied until he has drawn […]
Throughout Scripture, God’s presence is manifested symbolically, in a burning bush, a pillar of fire, a column of smoke, clouds on a mountaintop, a mighty wind, a whispering sound, a dove, or tongues of fire. God did not reveal himself as a hologram in the same fashion as Princess Leia appeared to Luke Skywalker and Obi Wan Kanobi in Star Wars. Instead, God chose to reveal his mysterious, transcendent, invisible, and intangible presence through tangible, […]
According to linguist Noam Chomsky, “Language embodies the world view of a culture and is unique to the culture that created it. It reflects values and concepts that are deemed to be the most important by a culture. A language describes the culture it comes from.” For this reason, it is imperative that Catholic parents speak God’s language at home, especially when children are preparing for a sacrament. What do we mean by the phrase, […]
The Trinity is a beautiful mystery that cannot be fully explained or understood through human language, which makes it a challenge to communicate to children when we rely on words in our catechesis. The early Christians came to know God as trinitarian through their lived experiences of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We can help children to identify their own experiences of the Persons of the Trinity and therefore come to a […]
Care for God’s creation is a tenet of Catholic social teaching, a fact emphasized by Pope Francis in his encyclical Laudato Si’, “On Care for Our Common Home.” Help the families in your parish or school understand what the Church says about caring for the environment with this faith-sharing guide available for download here at Catechist’s Journey. Excerpted from 52 Simple Ways to Talk with Your Kids about Faith by Jim Campbell, the guide invites […]
Recently, I enjoyed watching Death on the Nile, a Hercule Poirot mystery in which the Belgian detective uses his keen skills to gather clues leading to the solving of a complex crime. Like all detectives who themselves did not witness the crimes they are investigating, Poirot relies on his skills of observation to gather clues leading to an irrefutable conclusion. As we celebrate the Feast of Pentecost, we are reminded that we, too, must rely […]
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