Nick Wagner is the cofounder and codirector of Team Initiation.
I love stories, especially stories about how people got started in ministry. And more especially about how people got started in catechumenate ministry. We are, after all, a pretty specialized group. Sure, if we all showed up at a convention, it would look like there were a lot of us. But next time you are […]
How did you get started in RCIA ministry?
The Concord Pastor reminds us on this feast day about the implications of Pentecost. He cites Economic Justice for All, which bears reading for all of us who are trying to be faithful to RCIA 75:4: ((Since the church’s life is apostolic, catechumens should also learn how to work actively with others to spread the
How to catechize about apostolic mission in the RCIA
QOur church has just added over 100 children (candidates), 9 to 17-years-old, into the RCIA program. I have not been able to find information on discerning these baptized children. I am fairly new to the team and am finding discernment of children, or rather more specifically trying to determine when and who is ready, very
100 children in RCIA—what would you do?
Diana just created TeamRCIA’s essential reading list for catechumenate teams. It’s a work in progress, and there are more resources we want to list. But here’s a start. What’s missing? What resources does your team depend on? Click on comments, and share your secret sauce with the rest of us.
Ever have one of those days? Ever have a string of them? Last week, I thought I should have just stayed in bed for most of it. I wish I’d have seen Mike St. Pierre’s post, 6 Ways to Rebound from a Tough Week, earlier. Here’s my favorite from the list: Don’t give up by
One of the complaints I sometimes hear from catechumenate teams is that the parish isn’t really the full expression of church that the catechumens-now-neophytes might have come to expect. It is one thing to catechize them fully and correctly about how word, worship, community, and service are fully realized in the Body of Christ as
What happens after the catechumenate?
All of us here at TeamRCIA.com are active team members with the North American Forum on the Catechumenate. We serve on Forum institutes to provide ministers-volunteer and paid, full and part-time, lay and clergy-with deeper understanding of the vision of the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults and the skills to implement the Rite. If
Plan to train your team this fall
Click here to check out a description of the process used in a small, rural parish to welcome two baptized candidates into full communion. It looks pretty good to me. I loved this line: We reflected long and hard on the appropriate moment for reception, and decided against using any form of combined rite at
Is there a better way to receive candidates than this?
The folks over at Walking the Rite Way have posted a review for catechumenate teams to help us reflect on how things are going. They take the review to a deeper level than simply asking what worked well and what didn’t. For instance, one of their review points asks how we view our own baptism:
Spring checklist for RCIA teams
When do you introduce your introduce your inquirers to Scripture? I think for most folks, it’s pretty early on. I try to at least connect the inquirers’ stories with a story from Scripture, even if I don’t pull out a Bible and read the story exactly. Certainly by the time they are showing signs of
How to read the Bible in the RCIA process
