With everything else going on during the Triduum, the preparation rites on Holy Saturday can get a little lost. If you are feeling overwhelmed, the first thing to know is that only one thing is required. The elect are to be advised that on Holy Saturday they should refrain from their usual activities, spend their […]
A brief primer on the Holy Saturday RCIA Preparation Rites
It never fails… whenever I talk with fellow RCIA catechists about our year-round process, I inevitably get the question, “Does that mean you run your sessions all year round?” My answer is always a definitive “no!” Running a year-round process does not mean you have to run catechetical session all year round. Instead, it’s understanding
Is your RCIA open all year-round? Does this mean year-round catechetical sessions?
If you’ve been following this series you know we’ve suggested throwing out your syllabus and letting the liturgy and the liturgical seasons guide your catechesis. To wrap up this portion of moving to a year round process I’d like to offer a few more practical tips that can help you move to liturgically based process…
Is your RCIA open all year-round? Let the liturgical seasons be your guide, Part 3
If you’ve been following this series, you know that we recommend throwing out your syllabus and using the liturgical seasons of the Church as your guide to catechesis. So… what might that actually look like? Here are some practical ideas: Don’t plan your schedule in a bubble A big part of becoming Catholic is becoming
Is your RCIA open all year-round? Let the liturgical seasons be your guide, part 2
As a way to move to a year-round process, I recommended last time that you should throw out your syllabus. And while I feel there’s good reasons for doing this, it does create something of a problem: What do I do now? How do I convey to our catechumens and candidates everything they need to
Is your RCIA open all year-round? Let the liturgical seasons be your guide (Part 1)
Your catechumens had been participating in the Liturgy of the Word for months, maybe even for years, and they pretty much know the routine. But now that they’re neophytes and are no longer dismissed from the Mass after the homily, some of them might be feeling a little lost in their new experience of the
How neophytes learn to participate in the Mass
Should baptized candidates celebrate their sacraments at the Easter Vigil? Probably not, but there are exceptions. The National Statues for the Catechumenate tell us that baptized candidates should not celebrate their sacraments at the Easter Vigil so there won’t be any confusion between them and those who are being baptized (see no. 33). Within the
Six common RCIA questions about Easter Vigil
A question that keeps popping up for RCIA teams is how to get more parishioners involved in the initiation process. The best answer to this is the liturgy. If you think of where most of the parish gathers most often, it is the Sunday liturgy. So it makes sense that would be the place to
How to use the power of the liturgy to involve your parishioners in the RCIA
I teach an eight-evening course on liturgy in my diocese every year. The students are parish volunteers who serve on liturgy planning committees or in music ministry or in some other pastoral role. They show up on the first night with their empty vessels, expecting me to fill them to the brim with liturgical knowledge.
Is your RCIA team just filling vessels?
Some time ago, I was giving a workshop on how parishes could improve their liturgy. A man in the back row stood up and told us all that we were wasting our time. As long as we had a validly ordained priest who was consecrating the Body and Blood of Jesus, that was all that
Four reasons Mass matters for your catechumens
