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Pop-Up Catechesis: Our Hearts Are Restless

One of the things that I get a kick out of when watching our grandchildren is seeing how restless they can get—and knowing that eventually we will return those restless children to their parents to deal with! On a spiritual level, we never really outgrow that restlessness. We continually seek rest or fulfillment in any number of things. In reality, as St. Augustine famously wrote, “our hearts are restless, Lord, until they find rest in you.” […]

Professional Development Workshop: Reclaiming the Fire

Joe Paprocki

In her book, Start with Jesus, friend, author, speaker, and evangelist Julianne Stanz states that “too often our approach to our faith lacks the fire or energy that it deserves,” and she issues a call for us to “reclaim the fire.” Faith formation programs can provide the spark needed to ignite this blaze! In a new, free professional development workshop, Reclaiming the Fire: Six Keys to Making Our Faith Formation More Evangelizing—which can be found below—I offer […]

Helping Parents with Faith Formation at Home

Joe Paprocki

We ended the last catechetical year with many parishes asking parents to work with their children at home on faith formation because of the pandemic. Our hopes were, of course, that we would soon see a return to normalcy and that, come fall, young people and catechists could once again resume in-person sessions of faith formation at the parish. Alas, those hopes have been dashed in many parts of the country where the pandemic lingers […]

Re-Starting Religious Education This Fall: Loyola Press Digital Resources to Assist Parents and Parishes

Joe Paprocki

As the pandemic continues and with fall right around the corner, parishes are making decisions about how to re-start religious education programs safely and wisely. Among the options being considered are: in-person sessions catechists teaching remote lessons parents teaching lessons at home a hybrid or combination of some of each of the above. The bottom line is parishes are looking for versatility and flexibility when it comes to using quality, approved catechetical resources with families […]

Preparing Hearts and Minds: 9 Simple Ways for Catechists to Cultivate a Living Faith - blog series based on book of same title

Preparing Hearts and Minds Strategy 9: Empower Disciples to Evangelize

Joe Paprocki

Welcome to the final installment of our summer series, Preparing Hearts and Minds: 9 Simple Ways for Catechists to Cultivate a Living Faith. Strategy #9: Empower disciples to evangelize. Hardly anyone purchases anything online these days without first reading the customer reviews. Satisfied customers are eager to leave glowing reviews, which often include personal stories about how they have successfully used a product or resource in their own situation, in hopes that others in similar […]

Preparing Hearts and Minds Strategy 8: Build and Deepen Commitment

Joe Paprocki

Welcome to the penultimate installment of our summer series, Preparing Hearts and Minds: 9 Simple Ways for Catechists to Cultivate a Living Faith, based on my book of the same name. Strategy #8: Build and deepen commitment. Many advertisements not only entice us to purchase a product, but they invite us to re-prioritize our lives around an idea. Some of the best examples of this are diet plans, which are no longer just about losing a […]

Pop-Up Catechesis: St. Ignatius of Loyola and Striving for the More

Joe Paprocki

Coaches often encourage their players to give 110%, which simply means to always strive for more. This idea of wanting to do more, or magis (MAH-jiss) in Latin, was at the heart of St. Ignatius of Loyola’s spirituality: we should always strive to do more “for the greater glory of God.” In today’s episode of Pop-Up Catechesis, we prepare for the Feast of St. Ignatius on July 31 by exploring the concept of magis. For more […]

Introducing Springs of Faith: A Catechumenal Approach to Infant Baptism Preparation

Joe Paprocki

For too long, infant Baptism preparation has been little more than a “hoop” to jump through in order for parents to have their baby baptized. That’s why I am so excited to share the news about a wonderful new program from Loyola Press: Springs of Faith. I’m proud to be associated with this program as I contributed to the writing of a number of its components and did catechetical reviews of most aspects of the […]

Preparing Hearts and Minds Strategy 7: Aim for the Heart

Joe Paprocki

In this installment of our summer series, Preparing Hearts and Minds: 9 Simple Ways for Catechists to Cultivate a Living Faith, we look at strategy #7, aiming for the heart. Strategy #7: Aim for the Heart! In his research about why some things “go viral” on social media, author Jonah Berger discovered that one of the main reasons is that the item provokes emotion, whether good or bad. Think about it: if you had a nickel […]

Pop-Up Catechesis: Holy Hiking and the Feast of St. James

Joe Paprocki

Except for when we may be engaged in contemplative prayer or Adoration, we Catholics rarely sit still. Even when we worship at Mass, we sit, stand, kneel, genuflect, bow, cross ourselves, and walk in procession. We are a people “on the move“—pilgrim people. One of the most profound examples of this embodiment of our faith is the concept of a pilgrimage, and the “gold standard” of pilgrimages is, of course, the Camino de Santiago (Way […]