My grandmother loved to watch chickadees flitting about her front yard. To attract them, she would hang a cage of suet off the corner of her front porch. I’ve never seen suet used by anyone else, and I always thought it was something unique to my grandmother. Suet is animal fat that is used in […]
8 Powerful Steps to Attract Inquirers
A press release is a general announcement that companies and event organizers send to media outlets in the hopes that the newspaper or the radio station will give them some free publicity. When e-mail became ubiquitous, the old-fashioned press release morphed into something else — spam. I got a dozen of these spam messages in
Stop sending out RCIA press releases
If someone asks you about becoming Catholic this summer, don’t tell them to come back in September. You can start catechizing them right away, even if you don’t have a year-round process. Here are 20 ideas to get you started. 20 ways to catechize this summer — even if you don’t have a year-round catechumenate.
20 ways to catechize this summer — even if you don’t have a year-round catechumenate
If you are trying to attract inquirers to your parish, consider blogging. A blog will draw people to your community every day of the year, at all hours of the day. Why should you blog? Here are five benefits to creating a blog for your outreach ministry. Attraction. When you write about compelling topics and
One of our most popular articles was one I wrote a while ago about how to improve what we say about RCIA in our parish bulletins. Almost every parish has something in their bulletin that invites seekers into the RCIA process. Unfortunately, the vast majority of people who we are writing to in those announcements
Four ways to attract more seekers using social media
I’m going to save you $5,000. That’s how much 27-year-old consultant Gabrielle Jackson Bosche charges to translate the world of millennials into concepts older people can understand. Most of what she has to say, however, is common sense. Decoding the millennial generation Bosche frames her insights for the business world, but it is easy enough
Common sense ideas for attracting millennials to your parish
My friend, musician and composer John Angotti, recently led a retreat for a grade school near me. He asked the children if anyone wanted to sing. Liliah, a little second-grader, raised her hand and stepped forward. But then she got crippling stage fright and began to tear up. John picked her up, told her everything
This little light of mine — how to let it shine
If you have noticed a decline in the number of inquirers you have had in recent years, there is a very clear reason. From the inception of the modern catechumenate in the 1970s, the number-one source of new Catholics has been people who marry into the faith. However, while the Catholic population in the United
The simple truth about getting more RCIA inquirers
We are disciples. Being so has its pluses and minuses. The advantage of being a disciple The big plus is, we get to do the work of Jesus. This has been true from the very beginning. In Mark’s gospel, Jesus “called the twelve and began to send them out two by two” (6:7). While they
How to feed 5,000 on a Tuesday in Advent
Avanti! That’s what Pope Francis says over and over again. Go forth! For Pope Francis, there is only one image of the church that is life-giving — a church that goes forth, that goes out of itself, into the streets. Pope Francis wants us to be a church that goes to the peripheries. This is
Pope Francis’s message to RCIA teams: Avanti!
