The new "Some Definite Service" programme is working, say Catholics in the Southwark archdiocese.

They say the programme is behind the 450 adults who completed the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults (RCIA) course this year.

They also assert the programme is behind the 164 percent increase in RCIA candidates since last year, the highest figure since 2015.

The new programme encapsulates Archbishop John Wilson's vision of Southwark being a "missionary and evangelising archdiocese" says the archdiocese's Agency for Evangelisation and Catechesis.

Agency director Mark Nash says the programme focuses on "evangelisation, catechesis and formation supported by local people, plans and prayer".

A place of invitation

The Some Definite Service programme aims to create "a missionary volunteer network" Nash says.

The programme has two parts to it, he explains. It aims to establish a new structure within the archdiocese. It also aims to inculcate a new language.

Nash says one example is "intentional accompaniment".

This is "an overarching way of behaving, which has at its heart the willingness to aid the growth of another person and through them, the growth of others".

Another example is "active listening".

"I think that's been a fundamental shift, actually. People are talking a lot more about the need to evangelise."

Instead of working alone or in small groups, they're being connected with one another. Each has a distinctive role to play in God's "great work" he says.

Support crucial

Participants have an extensive support system, which is crucial to the programme's success.

Instead of organisers creating a structure and objectives, then relying on individual initiative to accomplish a complex goal, Southwark's volunteers have a network to call on.

They are part of a wider team and know where to get help.

"There's a quite a bit of commitment on the part of the archdiocese and also the archbishop, because they have invested ... all the resources necessary. They're a phone call away" one volunteers says.

It is very transformative. "The parishes are coming alive."

Greater cohesion

The team overseeing Some Definite Service is clear about what it wants from parishes, given many parishioners are overburdened.

"We want each parish to develop a parish plan that can be refined over time" Nash says.

He says the team also want parishes to select three parish leads — one each for evangelisation, catechesis and formation.

"We're also asking them to pray."

Although the programme is still being developed, growth is ongoing.

"The single biggest thing is actually articulating and offering them [parishioners] something of a vision.

"Something that's expectant, something that's inspired.

"I think people will commit to something for a very short period of time if they feel as though they have to do it.

"But they are willing to commit themselves generously if they see something as being fundamentally worthwhile."

Source

• The Pillar

PC vice president Bishop Shane Mackinlay says he believes "in time we will look back on this as an extremely significant event in the life of the Church in Australia".

The initial failure of the motions about women deacons and opportunities for women was a "terrible look" for the Church, he says. "It was perceived as a rejection of the legitimate concerns women and men in the Church have had for so long."

John Warhurst, a church reform advocate calls it "an encouraging step forward from a group of men who wield ultimate power in the church and have resisted any effective recognition of ministries for women in the past".

"Now we have some hope that the Australian Church can move towards meeting the ideal of gender equality accepted in other parts of society."

While Catholic feminist Marilyn Hatton says she's delighted the Church sees it must improve gender equality, she's disappointed the motion on female deacons has been "watered down". "It would be much better if our bishops were on the front foot on this issue", she says.

Conversely, Maeve Louise Heaney from the Australian Catholic University says the revised motions are superior to the originals.

After two motions were redrafted, 18 of the 19 PC motions were passed.

How they voted

Women deacons

New opportunities for women

The equal dignity of women and men ... including "enhancing the role of women in the Church" and "overcoming assumptions, culture, practices and language that lead to inequality"

Hearing women's perspectives: Ensuring "the experiences and perspectives of women, including women who exercise ministry, are heard, considered and valued at local, diocesan and national levels"

Implementing documents: Previous Australian bishops' documents will be implemented "more fully"

New English Mass translation

Lectors, acolytes and catechists: Formation ministries to be promoted

Reviewing guidelines on preaching: "For lay people to participate in a formal ministry of Preaching in the Latin Church, as provided for in canon 766 of the Code of Canon Law."

Lay homilies: The assembly rejected a motion seeking "an amendment to canon 767 to permit ... those entrusted ... to in the Eucharistic assembly ..."

Catechesis on confession

General absolution

Youth ministry: "Ongoing support and strategies for those who minister to young people", the promotion of "the rich variety of spiritual and devotional traditions of the Church" and "synodal practices such as encounter, accompaniment, listening, dialogue, discernment and collaboration"

Strategic policies: to "Identify and support ministry and leadership formation"

Cooperation: to "Help develop formation programmes"

Working group on formation

Working group on Catholic social teaching

Five-year review: plus interim reports in 2023 and 2025 with final in 2027

Review of previous decrees: "To determine those whose validity may endure" following Vatican II and changes to Church law

Closing the council

Source

• Pillar
• Sydney Morning Herald

German Cardinal Reinhard Marx, a member of the Pope's council of cardinals, spoke at a conference in Dublin, Ireland.

The cardinal later told CNS, "When you see the institutions and the organisation of the Church, there must be a new relationship between laypeople and clerics."

Cardinal Marx said he had told Pope Francis on a several occasions, "We have to de-clericalise the curia and bring in more competent laymen and women and make the Church professional".

In his conference speech, the cardinal said he believes the Christian faith is "the religion of the future".

It is not a religion dealing in "magic" things, he said.

"It is instrument for a better world and that must be shown, and so it is very important that the Church has a positive view of the modern world," he said.

Cardinal Marx said the Church must provide formation to its members to deal with the complex issues in pluralist societies.

But this must be "without forgetting" their faith sources and principles.

In his speech, Cardinal Marx admitted there were episodes in history "when the Christian faith wasn't on the right side".

But he stressed that "in the future we want to be there in the development of a society which is based on values and responsible freedoms" based on the Church's social doctrine and Christian anthropology.

He said that Church teaching could help the economic world "think beyond capitalism" and challenge an outlook which assesses results only in economic terms.

After his speech, Cardinal Marx suggested the Church should not oppose civil unions.

But he said "marriage is another point".

He said that the "history of homosexuals in our society is a very bad history because we have done a lot to marginalise them, and so as Church and as society we have to say, ‘Sorry.'"

On Sunday, Pope Francis was asked about Cardinal Marx's comments about an apology to homosexual people.

The Pope said there are plenty of other groups who probably also deserve a Church apology.

Sources

• Catholic News Service
• Crux
• Image: Catholic News UK

Cardinal Robert Sarah told French Catholic magazine "L'Homme Nouveau" he ascribed this to "the insufficiency of the formation of my confreres".

"And insofar as I am responsible for the discipline of the sacraments in the whole Latin Church, I am bound in conscience to recall that Christ has re-established the Creator's original plan of a monogamous, indissoluble marriage ordered to the good of the spouses, as also to the generation and education of children," the Guinean cardinal said.

"He has also elevated marriage between baptised persons to the rank of a sacrament, signifying God's covenant with his people, just like the Eucharist."

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Former executive director Sr Janet Mock emphasised the need for inter-congregational ministries.

The St Joseph Sister said there could be no "superstars" in religious life.

Sr Mock discussed the need for current leadership to ensure that younger sisters are prepared intellectually, spiritually and psychologically for the world.

Sr Mock said there are about 1200 women in the United States in initial formation.

"What if we addressed these needs across congregations together?" Sr Mock asked the audience.

"Because, after all, these women are ours."

One group discussion explored the idea of having inter-congregational small groups of women in initial formation that could engage, grow and even fail together.

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The Pope was speaking to a conference of religious formation directors in Rome on Saturday.

He told the 1200 directors that they must be "gravely attentive" to those they are guiding.

This is so that "the eventual crisis of quantity does not result in a much graver crisis of quality".

"Vocational discernment is important," Francis said, according to an article in the National Catholic Reporter.

He continued: "All the people who know the human personality - may they be psychologists, spiritual fathers, spiritual mothers - tell us that young people who unconsciously feel they have something unbalanced or some problem of mental imbalance or deviation unconsciously seek strong structures that protect them, to protect themselves."

"There is the discernment: to know to say no," said the Pope, referring to formation directors who tell young people that religious life may not be for them.

But Francis also encouraged the directors not to "chase away" such young people.

"Like you accompany the entry, accompany also the exit, so that he or she finds their way in life, with the needed help," he said.

Pope Francis said it is sad when a young person who has been considering religious life chooses another path, and "this is hard."

"But it is also your martyrdom," he told the directors.

"And the failures, these failures from the point of view of the formation director, can foster the continuing path of formation in the director."

"Some say that the consecrated life is paradise on Earth," the Pope joked.

"No. If anything, [it is] the purgatory! But go forward with joy, go forward with joy."

In a report last year, the Vatican stated that the higher numbers of people in religious life in the United States in the 1960s was an historical aberration.

Sources

• National Catholic Reporter
• Image: Washburn Chamber

Held in Denver late last month, the aim was to brainstorm and swap ideas about improving parish life, the Catholic News Agency reported.

The newly-founded Amazing Parish movement seeks to provide a one-stop shop for resources to pastors and parish leaders so they can create a thriving parish life.

The conference featured Catholic speakers and workshops on topics such as parish leadership teams, formation programmes and evangelisation.

Many of the speakers were Catholics serving in leadership roles for big companies, who are adapting tricks of the trade of company leadership to practical ideas for parish leadership.

"The Church is larger than maybe any company that these kind of guys work with, so we have to be strategic," said Amazing Parish staff member Chris Stefanick.

"We have to have the best practices and good team building skills and so I think what we're given is really unique here and it's been received really well."

Mr Stefanick is also a social media evangelist at reallifecatholic.com and helped host the conference, which filled to its 500-person capacity before it was even officially advertised.

"Both that and how it's been received, it just confirms that it's meeting a very huge need in the Church," he said.

For Mr Stefanick, the biggest hope he had for the parishes who attended was that they come away with clarity of both vision and practice.

He called for reduced complexity and a focus on what parishes can do well with what they have.

Everyone at the conference received a binder with guiding questions and planning sheets for each of the seven foundational parts needed to create an amazing parish.

These are made up for three foundational traits: a reliance on prayer, a real leadership team, and a clear vision, as well as four other traits, which are the Sunday experience, compelling formation, small group discipleship and missionary zeal.

During the conference, parish representatives were encouraged to focus on those things that made their parishes unique and how they could work with those characteristics.

Tim Weiske, a parishioner at St Clements in Chicago, said he thought a good goal to focus on for their parish was forming their large young adult population.

Sources

• Catholic News Agency
• Amazing Parish
• National Catholic Register
• Image: Catholic News Agency

"What we have in common is the Pacific, the ocean. I think it is great that we can share a little bit of the vision and future of the seminaries in the area," said Fr. Pius Sammut OCD, itinerant catechist responsible for the Neo-Catechumenal Way for the Pacific. He stated, "It is an enriching experience to see what is happening in Fiji, Solomon Islands, Australia, and other areas, to see the rectors come together sharing their ideas and knowledge on how to run the seminary, identify common problems and views, and be in communion with many priests, rectors, and formators who serve the Church and the seminaries."

In the course of the meeting the seminary rectors had several sessions on topics relating to priestly formation; new evangelisation, multi-cultural and anthropological issues, moral and faith formation challenges.

The principal speaker was Fr. Denis Vincent Twomey SVD, Emeritus Professor of Moral Theology at St. Patrick's College in Maynooth, Co. Kildare, Ireland.

On Thursday, the seminary rectors concelebrated a special Eucharist with the Most. Rev. Anthony Sablan Apuron, OFM, Cap. D.D., at the Dulce Nombre de Maria Cathedral Basilica.

Source

• Umatuna.org
• Image: Umatuna.org