TeamRCIA will host a webinar on moving to a year-round catechumenate on Thursday, October 25, 2012 at 11 a.m. Pacific time. Please take a moment to respond to these questions because your input will help shape the discussion during the webinar.
TeamRCIA will host a webinar on moving to a year-round catechumenate on Thursday, October 25, 2012 at 11 a.m. Pacific time. Please take a moment to respond to these questions because your input will help shape the discussion during the webinar.
Thank you for this opportunity to share our experience. It is always a balancing act between what the Rite book says and the reality of people’s lives along with the pastor’s vision. I just keep going back to a message given me when I first went through my RCIA training: Our job as RCIA team members is to help people feel welcome and help them to fall in love with Jesus Christ. The rest is up to the Spirit and those who have been given this great Gift! The relationship is not set at the time of their initiation. They are not fully developed and have the joy of a life time of becoming more “in Christ”. It is a great journey!
We have a core team of five people who are trained facilitators. This means each person leads one catechesis and one Breaking Open the word per month. This is not not a heavy burden for anyone. We then have another group of people who we bring in for one or two catechetical sessions during the year.
My wife and I have been doing dismissal for over 22 years. She herself became Catholic which started our involvement in the program. One thing that I think is important is a 3 day retreat hopefully during lent with elect and recognized. The years we have done this retreat (have not been all of them because lack of time or financial reasons) seem to produce more involved Catholic participating parishoners.
It has been my experience that since fewer people attend Mass during the summer, most people don’t hear about our RCIA program until September when our Faith Formation classes begin (through word of mouth). Also, in the 9 years that I conducted the RCIA Program, almost no one showed up for classes after the Easter Vigil unless I threatened not to give them their “certificates”!
we have only had year round RCIA for 2 years now so we are still adapting and adjusting – we do have an inquiry group that meets year round (with summer break (July-August) which helps facilitate folks entering the process
The nuber of Catechumens and Candidates who would attend during the summer months would be minimum because of the burden it would place on their families.
Several times in my nine years of directing the RCIA I have had people who said they were not ready to continue into the Rite of Election, but wanted to keep coming to the sessions. I told them we would be covering the basic material they had already had but they said they thought that would be helpful, since they didn’t feel ready and they would be with a different group of people who would bring new questions and concerns. One lady came from August until January, and then quit to have her baby. A year and a half later she came back and celebrated 1st Eucharist and Confirmation on Pentecost because we were waiting on her annulment papers. I ask the neophytes to continue to come to Mystagogia sessions up until Pentecost, and usually about half of them do this.
Thank you.
Totally agree with Tommie’s approach. The same basic idea has worked well for us as we continue to grow with the year round approach.
Interested in moving to year round RCIA
Our parish just extended our RCIA program to begin in the middle of August to the end of May. We have instituded a spring retreat for our class members sponsored by the HNS and open to the whole parish. We found that in opening the retreat to the parish there was much more support for our RCIA members. We haven’t gone to a year round program because most of our parish members take vacations during the summer and attendance would be small.
We have a year-round RCIA. I told Father and my team that the Holy Spirit does not work off a school year calendar. We have to be receptive of whoever, whenever. The Team consists of 6 persons, including two of the Deacons. For dismissals, I recruit Lectors to facilitate since they are most familiar with reading the Word before Mass. It introduces more parishoners to the catechumens, more names and faces, makes them feel more a part of the community(family). We are not a big parish, approx. 750 families. Still adapting and learning together.
Sorry, forgot to add, we meet every other week during the summer and skip the last two weeks of August. Folks seem to be able to plan vacation times around that schedule.
We have a team to meet with candidates as they are ready to begin the pre-catechumenate. After the Rite of Acceptance, we have a team of five catechists who alternate each Sunday. Of course we make allowances for vacations, and the like, but we are operational year round.